Volume 4, Entry 52: Clip Show ‘23

Closing an old book before opening a new one

When the calendar turns each year, we tend to look aggressively forward. Between New Year’s resolutions, broader goal-setting, and CGP Grey-style theming, our focus is the future and how we can both optimize and grow during the coming twelve months.

Before the calendar turns, though, we look backward. It might be the one time of year when reflection is everybody’s jam. Examining all that has happened inspires what follows. We make plans for tomorrow informed by yesterday’s; we inspect the past to choose a future to pursue.

Gazing backward is a favorite pastime of mine, which contributes to my affection for year-end wrap-ups. Dorkfest is my favorite, but I’m a sucker for articles and videos alike in the “Top _______s of ____” genre. I click on far too many of them.

Until 2017, I wrote an extensive wrap-up on New Year’s Eve each year, but those reflective look-backs were limited. I didn’t take the task seriously since I reasoned that nobody cared. Earnest investment struck me as vain.

But I care. Maybe it’s just me who does, but I do care, so I chose to be rigorous this time. What did that look like? I reread every piece I published in 2023 during the last two weeks and devoted time to reflecting on the writing I produced.

Ultimately, I did this as a gesture of self-respect. I wanted to take my own work seriously. If there’s one thing I succeeded in this year, it was writing prolifically: between 54 newsletters, 108 Finsta pieces, and a novel draft, I wrote hundreds of thousandths of words. But those numbers underscore the actual time I invested, as each newsletter essay also underwent a rigorous revision process.

I often questioned the purpose of this extra work. Although my weekly readership is higher than ever before, responses and feedback remain rare. The exercise of writing certainly serves me—this newsletter is my Therapy Thursday—but self-doubt grows like mold on a warm puddle of McFlurry. Internal debate over the value of that investment happened daily.

But a year of written hustle left little time for retracing my steps, meaning these recent revisitations marked my first time closely reading most of my pieces since their initial postings. To say they blew me away understates the experience. I was consistently moved by the stories I shared and stimulated by the sophisticated connections I made. I shocked myself with the abundant evidence of my growth as a writer and artist posted every Sunday.

2023 closes with me more confident than ever that my work meant something. Maybe I haven’t found my audience just yet; maybe I never will. But this year, I’ve treated myself seriously, which is one hell of an achievement for a person conditioned to self-loathing.

With that in mind, I present Clip Show ‘23. I redesigned last year’s format, replacing several categories so that I could celebrate my writing process more prominently instead. There’s more than that here—including, of course, my top 10 movies list—but this year is less media-dominant than before.

As a helpful guide, here are the categories I countdown in this piece linked to each section. Please note that each item gets exactly two sentences. All of the odd-numbered lists deal with my work; the even-numbered ones focus on popular media.

Top 11 Newsletter Entries
Top 10 Movies
Top 9 Artwork Images
Top 8 YouTube Channels
Top 7 Finsta Posts
Top 6 Songs
Top 5 Writing Achievements
Top 4 TV Shows
Top 3 Unpublished Pieces
Top 2 Books
Top 1 Novel Drafts

I hope you enjoy reading at least some part of this. Even if you don’t, I certainly enjoyed putting it together.

Top 11 Newsletter Entries

NOTE: If you are actually interested in my process and self-assessment, I recorded a tier list video rating all 53 pieces I published here in 2023 (excluding this one) as a reflective exercise and have published it in unlisted form on YouTube. Be advised: there’s genuine emotion in that video that confirms just how much this work means to me.

#11. SPOILERS! (Volume 4-12)

Although I wrote several pieces responding to media this year that told more personal stories, I’m convinced none was better than this one discussing the precarious experience of watching 2016’s Christine. A review of the film centers the second half, but it’s my rumination on spoilers, particularly as they relate to the true story behind Christine, that elevates this into writing I am proud of.

#10. Heart(h) (Volume 4-14)

The best “Tennis court, eh?” piece I wrote this year begins by discussing HVAC repair and wedding photos before arriving at a story of faded friendship. Elevated by its artwork and the extra-textual story of how it resurfaced during Therapy Thursday, “Heart(h)” is prime for a revisitation someday when the sting of my friend never responding finally relents.

#9. Inclusive Instruction (Volume 4-44)

A rare essay that sees me unwaveringly praise myself, “Inclusive Instruction” tethers a humiliating moment from eighth grade to a silly commercial I filmed in 2019 with Bria and Nate that teaches students about Rickrolls. I’m convinced this is maybe the best pure piece about teaching that I have written, and that it manages to be at once critical, fair, funny, and poignant earns it extra credit.

#8. My Little GIF (Volume 4-25)

One of the prevailing themes across my 51 essays this year was negotiating with the nature and feeling of adulthood, and “My Little GIF” is my most revealing and emotionally naked work on that subject. Recounting a persistent daydream, the piece makes this list not for its literalized hesitation structure nor its moving subject matter but its final sentences that devastate me every time because I know they are true.

#7. Certificate Paper (Volume 4-20)

I love writing pieces that champion individuals who have impacted me, and this essay exploring the origins of a Mathletes Banquet tradition is subtly just as much a vehicle to praise a former department chair. There was no thought of this piece landing here—particularly after it missed my Midpoint Report list—but no other piece addresses a multi-pronged, time-spanning story as satisfyingly as “Certificate Paper” while also landing in a warm place that looks forward with optimistic conviction.

#6. Jack Covey’s Castle (Volume 4-26)

Inspired by my first trip to Kloss Park in years, “Jack Covey’s Castle” explicitly grapples with the veil of privilege in a way I typically struggle to enunciate. Labeling this an essay about privilege, though, misses its point: this story of one third grader’s humble history project in 1995 is just as much about empathy, teaching, and the way in which memory can persist but only resolve into meaning decades after the fact.

#5. Personal Insight (Volume 4-41)

My initial ranking placed this higher, but that feels like a cheat: this is eight short pieces responding to the University of California’s application prompts, not an essay. Still, however you label it, there’s something special about distilling the form I employ each week into 350-word form that both tickled me and helped me raise my game as a personal statement advisor.

#4. Social Dining (Volume 4-47)

Wholly written during one two-hour block of Thanksgiving break, “Social Dining” provides my definitive answer to the ubiquitous question of why I love Five Guys so much, tracing its origins back to a single visit in 2015. But there’s more here than just that story as I explore the pandemic’s impact on my eating habits as a lens into one of the foundational stories of the person I am today.

#3. Cope Floats (Volume 4-17)

Maybe the best thing I’ve ever written, “Cope Floats” tells four defining stories about grief as the fifth anniversary of Katelyn’s suicide approached in April. Stupid title aside, everything works here, even the intrusive element rendering Michelle’s section appropriately unreadable, but this remains as much a gauntlet for me to re-read as it was to write, so optimistic though it is, I recognize the pain centering it will forever keep me from calling it my favorite.

#2. Nuzlocked (Volume 4-38)

Among my 53 previous posts, “Nuzlocked” received the fewest views in its first week, possibly owing to a Pokémon game mechanic providing both the essay’s title and its framing device. I’m certainly proud of the quality writing that breaks down what a Nuzlocke is, but this is the story of our family dog, Heidi, and, most movingly, a reflection about the enduring legacy of pets that, I suspect, would speak powerfully to many of those who turned their noses up when they saw the Pokémon logo.

#1. endgame.dll (Volume 4-36)

Objectively, I realize that this contemplation about dying isn’t some perfect piece of high art, but “endgame.dll” does perfectly capture what I wanted to say about a subject that is always running in the background of my mind. Met with a collective shrug, this essay represents proof of evolution for me in my style, as I flowed effortlessly between diverse angles and pop culture references without losing my thread en route to landing in a deeply personal but also universally reassuring place.

Top 10 Movies

NOTE: If you would like to see the list of every movie I saw this year and how I rated them, that can be found here on Letterboxd.

#10. Godzilla Minus One

Strenuously urged by Shibata to check this out, I was swept up by the massive wave of emotion delivered by heartfelt characters and a grand score with ratcheted-to-eleven intensity even when the giant lizard waits off-screen. My abundant tears during my first viewing had to contend with cynical assholes in my row, leaving a sour taste in my mouth, but a return trip with my family on Christmas Day punched me in the feels again, confirming that Godzilla Minus One is an entirely different beast than its predecessors.

#9. The Iron Claw

This true-story tragedy follows a family of professional wrestlers as they struggle to rise in the pre-WWF days, and the A24 adaptation is an emotional gauntlet despite pulling several punches to soften its blow. I only saw this one once, but Zac Efron’s incredible physical transformation impresses me as deeply as his delicate, empathetic performance and The Iron Claw’s ultimate message about the intersection of masculinity and emotion demanded I find a place for it on my list.

#8. Asteroid City

Wes Anderson released a terrific series of short films adapting works by Roald Dahl this year that deserves acclaim, but his latest feature also won me over, even though its disorienting play within a show within a movie structure kept me initially distant. I’ll never be able to explain what exactly this is, but I know that it makes sense on an emotional level, particularly in a powerful scene when an actor playing an actor playing a character steps out onto a balcony and briefly converses with a woman, inducing a waterfall of tears that is simultaneously out of left field and wholly earned.

#7. Talk to Me

An efficient horror film from A24, Talk to Me builds a fresh narrative around drug use, peer pressure, and family, resulting in a possession story that rarely settles for being just that. Daringly rebuffing questions about the central artifact’s origins and mechanics, the filmmakers craft a creepy genre entry around not scares but characters, particularly Sophie Wilde’s Mia, a believable teen fighting terror and trauma to do what she thinks is the right thing.

#6. Air

There’s an inherent awkwardness to this origin story for the Air Jordan brand not just centering on Nike executives and employees but actively erasing Michael himself from the story, and I’m not sure the gimmick elevates the film. For that reason, I secretly hoped this film would fall out of my top ten, but my second viewing reminded me how endlessly watchable this story of professional process and corporate hustle is, particularly when given extra life by dynamic Matt Damon and Viola Davis performances.

#5. Beau Is Afraid

I have less affection for Beau Is Afraid than I do for thinking about Beau Is Afraid, which speaks to how effectively Ari Aster renders this surrealist panic attack of a film. There’s altogether too much in its three-hour runtime, and everything is pitched at eleven as it races through a bizarre odyssey that borders on nonsensical, but this is a huge swing that I connect with to a shocking degree and will forever love, if not precisely like.

#4. The Holdovers

In sharp contrast to Beau Is Afraid, which offers a surreal puzzle box with hundreds of questions to probe, The Holdovers compulsively answers every query about its three memorable characters and proceeds toward an inevitable conclusion. That’s a feature, not a bug, though, as its accessibility leaves room for Alexander Payne’s dramedy to be remarkably funny and poignant, two notes that stars Paul Giamatti, Da’Vine Joy Randolph, and newcomer Dominic Sessa nail in every scene.

#3. Oppenheimer

If I ignore everything extra-textual that Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer brought to the table, I might push this down the list, noting that the parallel stories it tells do not engage me equally. But if ever there was a film to focus my response around the in-theater experience for, it would be this one which—alongside Greta Gerwig’s Barbie—catapulted movie-going into the zeitgeist for a month and produced my most memorable trip to the movies in 2023.

#2. May December

The only film on this list that I did not see in a movie theater, this soapy melodrama about exploitation feels like a psychological thriller while Natalie Portman and Julianne Moore fill the screen with huge performances as lisping, conniving vultures. My first viewing left me buzzing with questions about this taboo-treated puzzle box, but the second left me captivated and heartbroken for Charles Melton’s Joe, whose arrested development tragedy plays out with somber, underwritten clarity behind two clashing titans clawing for control.

#1. Past Lives

A contender for my favorite movie of all time and one I saw five times in theaters, Past Lives is a film of long pauses, a clear-eyed love story that understands the infinite nuance of the word “love”. Two sentences are two hundred too few to convey how much I love and connect with this film, but I’ll praise its impeccable narrative efficiency, its delicate generosity to all of its characters, and its optimistic but crushing ending that says so little but also absolutely everything about what it means to live and to love.

Top 9 Artwork Images

#9. endgame.dll (Volume 4-36)

One of my simplest creations, I nonetheless love the body language as I look up at the wolf; it conveys a smallness that isn’t quite synonymous with fear but isn’t wholly separate either. Fun fact: that’s my arm in a $30 Infinity Gauntlet with a real coin ready to flip.

#8. Craterbound (Volume 4-09)

Extracting an appropriately defined photo of Carly Rae Jepsen from the music video proved more challenging than I anticipated, but it’s that element that conveys the point of the written piece. It’s inexplicable to have such joyous, optimistic music deliver darkness, which makes the image of a giddy Jepsen pulling someone into a dead crater so haunting.

#7. Season Finale (Volume 4-21)

Photos of a packed Coliseum concourse aren’t common since so few people go to the games, meaning I had to create that density from scratch. The image achieves additional meaning by having every person obstructing me be me, which reflects the written piece’s thematic focus on personal growth.

#6. Christmas Cards (Volume 4-51)

Repackaging some of the lessons from the music video in 2020, this photo shoot began with a broken lightbulb but proceeded to test my logistical skills and patience. Resolution drop aside, there’s a tiny error in my editing that keeps this from being an all-timer, but the expression of the central figure amid such a colorful scene makes it a powerful supporting character to the essay.

#5. GUTS Check (Volume 4-37)

My first piece of artwork for the newsletter saw me recreating an album cover from Eve 6, so this wasn’t a wholly original idea, but I’m proud of the execution and refusal to be intimidated by mimicking Rodrigo’s pose. Within the confines of my wardrobe, I believe I captured the GUTS aesthetic well while adjusting my expression to better suit the story I tell around “teenage dream” and the existential dread induced by potential.

#4. Gas Leak Corner (Volume 4-27)

The only image I used actual PhotoShop on, the effects that stand out the most as I examine this were nonetheless achieved in PowerPoint. That the written piece talks about erasure—while repurposing a random lovesick Redditor’s photo—creates visual tension for the piece, which makes the photo’s actual arrival at the end, with Maurice fully present, cathartic.

#3. Failure to Ghost (Volume 4-05)

This is the only image that received compliments from a professional in the design field, and that praise elevates it for me because I obsess over the little details I missed. But I still love the purposeful construction: I stand between Colm and Pádraic, just as my story of unwanted friendship will forever hijack how I watch and respond to The Banshees of Inisherin.

#2. Live Music (Volume 4-31)

Actors and actresses playing real people often get a boost during awards season since voters can actually compare the performance to the genuine article, and this piece gets the Rami Malek-as-Freddie Mercury treatment. This image is far from original, but I love that I’ve captured the aesthetic of Taylor’s promotional material while showcasing all of the people and moments that defined my first-ever concert.

#1. Heart(h) (Volume 4-14)

Heart(h) is a story about forfeited friendship told through a frustrating HVAC system and missing wedding photos, but it still speaks to hope: the piece aimed to literally rebuild a bridge from the past to the present. This image tells that entire story, and now it hangs framed on my wall as a placeholder because Zelda* never responded, offering me a haunting reminder that warmth does not last forever.

Top 8 YouTube Channels

NOTE: I include only channels I watched for the first time this year.

#8. blameitonjorge

Unsolvable mysteries and fruitless searches will always plague the lost media community that often relies on random VHS recordings for discoveries, but there’s something mesmerizing about that endless search for answers. No channel has piqued my interest more than Jorge’s, with his iceberg and roundup videos exposing me to major stories and his deeper dives immersing me in unsettling lore about lost artifacts I didn’t even know were missing.

#7. Folding Ideas

I only stumbled across the channel of documentarian Dan Olson a few months ago, but his thorough explorations of such varied topics as NFTs, the GameStop short, and flat earthers have fascinated me. Olson doesn’t have the lightest touch, which occasionally renders a video too abrasive for me to fully enjoy, but I learn a ton from his video essays and quick hitters alike.

#6. Baseball’s Not Dead

As a spreadsheet fiend myself, I have endless appreciation for a creator who wields data tables like a weapon of joy. His comprehensive video about baseball movies might be my favorite all year, and I’m not sure any creator gifts me greater hope that I will continue loving baseball after the A’s leave than he does every single video.

#5. Woman Carrying Man

If you haven’t seen any of Man Carrying Thing’s comedic shorts, you’re missing out—they are both great and fresh—but it’s the second channel Jake runs with Nadia that I cherish the most. Reviewing movies and TV shows, the two sit comfortably with their pets and argue through their takeaways with a natural, gentle rhythm that evokes my favorite moments with my friends who are couples.

#4. The Canvas

Producing weekly videos about notable artists or works of art, The Canvas often moves me but always fascinates me regardless of what garners the spotlight. Shawn has a soothing voice, a keen critical eye, and an infectious passion for art that transcends the format, and I cite their channel as my top resource for building up cultural literacy and an appreciation for visual artwork.

#3. Hbomberguy

Harry Brewis has been a huge creator on YouTube for a long time, but Nate and Bria introduced me to his work this fall with ROBLOX_OOF.mp3, the antithesis of the forgotten artist documentary I love. His only main channel post of 2023 was even bigger than that: Plagiarism and You(Tube), a meticulous, nearly-four hour discussion of intellectual thievery that thoroughly takes down several grifting channels, explores the contributing factors to that dishonesty, and has already begun making waves on YouTube.

#2. The Cooler Jenny

My interests don’t actually overlap with Jenny Nicholson’s, but yet I could listen to her talk about chaotic theme parks, mediocre animation, and genre media for hours. Since this is her accessible-only-via-Patreon channel, I know anointing this as a top choice is a cop-out, but her monthly rambles are the best value five dollars can buy and my favorite avenue for generating the illusion of company while typing up tests or baking.

#1. LocalScriptMan

Nobody on YouTube contributes more to my craft of writing than Lucas does with his videos, which shred convention and challenge viewers to examine their characters and assumptions in productive ways. With a brash delivery that is as brash as it is mesmerizing, Lucas exudes intensity and coolness but has a passion for creation and process that injects me with a potent dose of introspection and ambition every time he posts.

Top 7 Finsta Posts

NOTE: In June, I wrote a piece about finstas, including my own second writing platform. Yes, there’s something odd about including non-accessible pieces, but it felt important to acknowledge them in a thorough year-end reflection.

#7. That Age (May 12, 2023)

Reflecting on coaching high school baseball, this piece responded to a somber health report about the man who made the strongest impression on me during those three years. Although the piece oozes bittersweet sadness while worrying that I would never see or speak to him again, I found a happy ending one week later: he came out to the next playoff game, letting me not just spend seven innings with him but drive him to the parking lot in the Gator.

#6. Cosplay (March 4, 2023)

By far the bleakest thing I wrote in 2023, I adapted this into “Thick Envelopes”, trimming away 80% of the piece to focus solely on the fellowship rejection letter that capped my least favorite day at school this year. Because I plan to revisit this here in March, I won’t say too much except that I managed to wring utter despair from the same Chicken Soup for the Soul story I included in Unsettled Respiration, which isn’t great but is darkly impressive.

#5. Floral Envy (July 4, 2023)

My response to finishing the first season of Phoebe Waller-Bridge’s Fleabag, I grappled with not just the emotion stirred up by the show but also an oft-told story about my late maternal grandmother whom I never met. Although I honor the show—more about that later—this addresses more deeply my concern about how other people see me and what my enduring legacy will be when I am gone.

#4. Pancake Man (March 11, 2023)

Whereas I gave “Frog Monkey” a full, formal treatment here, I settled for only a raw crack at this moment-at-school situation that centered on making pancakes for my Accelerated class. In many ways, this piece belongs in this year’s newsletter catalog because it negotiates with both what it means to be an adult as well as what it feels like, but I see “Pancake Man” as an investment in a piece that will mean far more in May 2025 as the characters the story centers on prepare for graduation.

#3. Fearless (February 22, 2023)

This critical examination of my first kiss has its origins in, I kid you not, a YouTube cooking podcast I watched on 1.5 speed, but that episode inspired an exploration of a moment that, frankly, I’ve been happy not to think about for years. This is the rare piece that truly belongs here but that I’m too embarrassed to discuss publicly, which is a win for the Finsta because that willingness to be raw lent that reflection incisive power.

#2. Nail House (August 4, 2023)

If you read “Metáfora” and wondered what the hell I was talking about, it was this piece that effectively connects every dot and underlines every ounce of meaning with a thick Sharpie. This is so much a newsletter that I made artwork for it—Metáfora’s is superior, don’t worry—but it also could never have been a newsletter because it connects too directly to other people, costing everyone my deep critical look at Taylor Swift’s “Cornelia Street” and the third longest thing I wrote this year.

#1. Embrace (March 7, 2023)

An unwitting companion piece to “Pancake Man”, this is unbelievably slight, devoting almost a third of its words toward explaining two situations and an activity that took place that day. This, just like “My Little GIF”, turns in its final lines when I discover, in written real-time, a truth that recontextualizes the entire episode and imbues it with amplified meaning that makes what I wrote trivial compared to the brief interactions I described.

Top 6 Songs

NOTE: This includes only songs released for the first time in 2023.

#6. “all-american bitch” - Olivia Rodrigo

While the initial track of SOUR took several plays to grow on me, I love the way this song toys with the listener musically from the start, shifting tones and genres to reflect cultural double standards. The track is catchy, too, but I’ll confess that it steals spot six thanks to her Saturday Night Live performance that delivered the same manic intensity that “good 4 u” did in 2021.

#5. “Electric Touch” - Taylor Swift

I centered two formal essays around songs in 2023, with the first being this vault track from the Taylor’s Version rerelease of Speak Now that sees Taylor share the stage with Fall Out Boy while singing about reluctant optimism before a first date. Whereas most Taylor songs that win me over owe it to their lyrics and stories, this one secures my affection with its sound that evokes the Chicago hits that carried me to and from UC Davis for years.

#4. “You’re Losing Me” - Taylor Swift

Most fans have known this “Cornelia Street” companion piece for only a few weeks, but I caught the brief drop window in May and have been hooked ever since. This is a song of lamentation with a beating heart providing the initial bass line, but it oozes woundedness as one of Taylor’s most primordially raw tracks while remaining as relentlessly listenable as it is moving.

#3. “teenage dream” - Olivia Rodrigo

The only essay I wrote that focused on a song rather than wove one in centered on this closing track from Rodrigo’s sophomore album that borrows its title from Katy Perry but not its tone. Instead of addressing a lover with giddy infatuation, this somber contemplation of promised potential is pragmatic about youthful success while interrogating the “It gets better” platitude.

#2. “Used to be Young” - Miley Cyrus

You can count the number of songs by Miley Cyrus that I know on one hand, but that only amplifies how much this song resonates with me. It doesn’t matter that the times Cyrus looks back on are very different than those I recall; this is a song about growing up and changing just like “teenage dream” but told from the other end of that development curve, and it still gets me every time.

#1. “Suburban Legends” - Taylor Swift

I just passed 550 plays of “Suburban Legends” this morning, which is a lot of plays across one year but more than a lot for a song that didn’t release until October 27th. That’s what happens when you discover several random elements of your novel outline in a song and let it become your singular soundtrack for a month of brainstorming and reflecting on the unrelated story you’re writing.

Top 5 Writing Achievements

#5. 100 Books Sold

The ledger on Sweet Appeal bleeds red ink from professional copy-editing and proof copy ordering, making it a financial disappointment even though money wasn’t the project’s point. Still, official sales reached triple digits last month without any meaningful advertising push, and that milestone blows my first novel’s sales out of the water.

#4. Essay About My Writing

Ahmad took a writing class at UC Davis this fall that required him to formally profile a writer for the course’s final assignment; he chose to feature me despite that being an unconventional choice. His decision flattered me, but it also inspired valuable reflection about what I do and why, and the final draft moved me when I got to read it last week.

#3. First Comment by Someone I Don’t Personally Know

Until Abby joined this summer, nearly every piece I’d ever posted had been met by a wall of crickets, which meant I was almost confused when a name I didn’t recognize left positive feedback on the piece about the new novel. Reading the short comment left by Michael Edward—whose own newsletter, The Curious Platypus, features stimulating work I highly recommend—plastered a smile across my face for the rest of the day.

#2. Published in a Magazine

As I read through an issue of California Educator in the spring, I discovered a section for publicizing creative works by current teachers. The editor agreed to publish a short blurb about Sweet Appeal, but she then invited me to submit a column about college admissions stress, which led to “Tunnel Vision”, which is nothing if not a shorter newsletter complete with an anecdotal framing device.

#1. Book Club Presentation

Referenced briefly in the opening salvo to Jack Covey’s Castle, the Elk Grove Book Club invited me to speak at their final celebratory meeting this summer. Although the Q&A included questions informed by my teaching, this was the first event I’ve ever attended that treated me like an author and writer without one hint of patronizing condescension—and they’ve already invited me back once the next one is finished.

Top 4 TV Shows

NOTE: I limited this list to only completed shows that I watched in their entirety during 2023.

#4. Succession

I didn’t actually enjoy watching Succession, racing through it so that I could watch a specific YouTube video about it. The petty dramas of the 1% make for a rich (ha) series, the lavish production is a technical marvel, and the perpetual backstabbing in the plot is both funny and entertaining, but I never found pleasure in watching it all play out, viewing the entire enterprise of binging it as an investment in pop cultural awareness.

#3. Jury Duty

I’ve started an essay about Jury Duty multiple times without sealing the deal, which says everything about how complicated my feelings are toward it, so I’m going to say less here, knowing I plan to return to that concept. For now, I’ll admit that the premise—a reality show where all but one person is acting—disturbs me deeply, but that the ending moves me on such a deep, almost spiritual level that much of that discomfort gets redeemed.

#2. Beef

Watching Steven Yeun and Ali Wong tear one another’s lives apart across a series of escalating acts of sabotage was like watching a car accident in real-time and being unable to look away. This was painful to watch even as it seemingly validated every worry I had as a child with a honk-happy mother, but it gripped me so hard that it became the only show all year that I struggled to turn off between episodes.

#1. Fleabag

Phoebe Waller-Bridge’s series began in 2016 and ended in 2019, but I watched it from start to finish in 2023, allowing myself exactly one episode per day across two weeks to savor and explore the emotions it stirred up. There were a handful of characters this year that I “imprinted” on, losing myself as their emotions swirled into my own, but Fleabag herself was by far the one least like me, certifying this twelve-episode short series as a visceral and moving but often hilarious masterpiece.

Top 3 Unpublished Pieces

NOTE: These pieces have not been published anywhere, although a handful of people have read one of them.

#3. “Slurp Slurp”

Almost assuredly the funniest thing I wrote all year—which isn’t saying much, given the blue tint on most of what I create—this is a farcical expansion of the old “If you lead a horse to water” saying applied directly to teaching. On the surface, there are definite laughs in the ridiculous imagery, but that I wrote it under the influence of explosive exasperation kept me from sharing the angriest invocation of anthropomorphic horses and curly straws in recorded history.

#2. “Hats Off”

I started a more ambitious version of this piece that explores the history of manners and attacks a particular restaurant chain’s (in my opinion) racist dress code, but this one attacks the same issues with fewer words but an equivalent boiling rage. That this also recounts my history with Spirit Days made it a tonal mess that muddied my intended waters, convincing me to shelve a piece that would have offered the most volcanic final lines of anything I have ever published.

#1. Distrust the Process

The fifth-longest piece I have ever written (behind four novels), this is my non-fictional companion to Sweet Appeal that weaves the story of Sam Hinkie’s disastrous run as the Philadelphia 76ers’ GM into a massive metaphor for the college admissions mess that plagues so many students I teach. The scope is so vast that the early drafts exceeded 9400 words and stretched widely enough to include Victor Wembanyama, a quoted-with-permission Therapy Thursday shareout, and my Calculus port of Cross the Line, making it altogether too much for a newsletter, but it did lay the groundwork for my 650-word piece “Tunnel Vision” that got published in California Educator.

Top 2 Books

#2. Yellowface by R.F. Kuang

2023 saw me read only two books published professionally in this millennium, so imagine my surprise when it turned out that this ripe-for-discussion recommendation by Julia was the Goodreads winner for best fictional work in 2023. As Alyiah knows, my initial reaction to Yellowface was skeptical, as the unreliable narrator at its center makes a series of ghastly, tone-deaf decisions with “her” manuscript, but it turns out that there is less unreality there than I had optimistically hoped.

#1. The Time Has Come by Will Leitch

A definitive post-pandemic world story, The Time Has Come follows a series of characters as they move in and out of one another’s lives en route to an intense and moving climax for every single one. There’s generosity toward every character here, even the least redeeming ones, and the warmth of the novel, particularly in light of its inspiration, Robert Altman’s Shortcuts, left me glowing, crying, and proud of my favorite writer on the planet.

Top 1 Novel Drafts

#1. The Gray Valley by Michael J Steele

My steady drip of little details about the novel continues here, which makes sense: closing this year of writing without acknowledging the largest project I undertook would be an error. This remains a draft that has been read by only me, but my read-aloud revisitation this month was rewarding and often moving, enough that I’m proud of what I created and excited to start gathering feedback to begin polishing it up in the year that follows.

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I hope you all close out your 2023s and ring in your 2024s in wonderful, warm fashion. Reading what I share invites you into my life, so I can graciously say thank you for being a part of my life.

All my love,