you know how it go when you young and ****—you gotta pop it

field notes from the roadshow on Mulberry

Apr 18, 2026

i’ve been going through some ****, but it’s alright

There’s a quiet tearing in my back. My bones rearranging themselves for flight. Wings arrive gradually, then all at once.

A couple months ago I told my mom I was mid-air—couldn’t see where I jumped from, couldn’t see where I’d land.

Now?

I used to pray for a destination. The exact summit I thought was mine for the taking. But God redirects.

Now I just pray to be here—close to Him.

Following the flight path. Savoring it.

came out swinging doors, posted in the kitchen, ***** on counters

It started at the airport. Flights to New York—cancelled, delayed.

Not mine.

As soon as we were airborne, I dropped my seat back and pulled out the manila envelopes. I loved the crinkle. Fiddling with the brass clasps.

There were three envelopes:

Manuscript — Campus Fiction (title + prologue)
Experimental — the codex in progress
Study — currently Palahniuk’s craft essays

I spent all three hours of the flight underlining, highlighting, taking notes.

As we descended, the beanie clad guy next to me—green hoodie (IT’S FUCKING SAINT PATRICK’S DAY)—tapped my shoulder.

“What do you do?”

“I’m a writer.”

“A writer? Like… you write? I mean what? Do you write?”

“I’m working on my book.”

“Damn. That’s fire. I didn’t know writers were still a thing.”

blowing all these *****, arguing with my accountant

On the way to the law office, I opened my illustrator’s email.

He sent over a proof for the second novella cover. Tangier Blues. I tapped my foot as I scanned and zoomed in on the pixels.

Close—but not there yet. It needed a little more restraint between the Young Man and Levi Lopez. The cat couldn’t look too sickly. Covers are Hollywood. They sell. Get you in your seat and then the truth plays.

My lawyer isn’t just mine—he’s ours. The family lawyer. Honorary fourth brother. Gregarious, ravenous Italian. Consigliere powered on equal parts uppers and downers. Texts like everything could be subpoenaed.

We started with a Chocolate croissant, split three ways. Big S(the lawyer), L (our rave loving long haired friend). I brushed the crumbs off his desk as the two talked their fantasy basketball lineups.

A Kramer-like office neighbor walked in, told us to watch Bulgonia. Then he pointed at L, told him he looked just like Jesse Plemmons. Big S pulled Jesse Plemmons up on his second monitor, turned it towards us. We all burst out laughing. Except L. He glared at Kramer lite as he bobbled out of the office, closing the door behind him.

L made some vague excuse, sniffed and slapped his knee before he stood. He was technically on the clock. On the city’s dime, and his three hour lunch break was coming to a close.

Now it was just Big S and I. A quick stop at the gyro truck across the street. Astoria’s finest. Then back to business, me melting into the chair. Big S snatching a post it from his computer monitor, furrowing his eyebrows as he read it. He mumbled to himself then crumpled it, tossed it over his shoulder. A quick clearing of the throat and he switched into counsel mode.

He had the answer to my question from the week before. In Campus Fiction I was going to incorporate three real life events that were controversial at minimum, ******* at most. The book was mostly fiction, but I knew braiding in these visceral moments would give it real voltage.

“So I looked up some cases. In 2007, Random House…”

“But it really happened that way.”

“Sure. But would you classify him as a public figure?”

“What defines that?”

“New York Times settled this way back. Basically…”

“Fuck.”

“I’d recommend—”

“Allude. I like that. That’s sexier.”

He fired off an email to a client, as I readied the manila with the manuscript.

“There. Now I can bill them for our convo.”

The only lawyer I like is mine. And I suppose whatever future lawyers my publisher sics on me.

I enjoy having an authority figure try to wrangle me in. And deep down, I know they love it too.

I started off March reading The Autobiography of Alice B. Tolkas. I was entranced by the collaborative atmosphere of the Parisian scene. These painters, writers, musicians, clowns—they were constantly on. In and out of their studios, salons, dinners, exhibitions. Sharing their work in progress, testing out new theories, talking techniques, breaking traditions. Inspiring one another through affirmation and disagreement.

I wanted that.

So the night before I left, I prepared the manuscript.

Ivory 120gsm paper. Baby blue electric Smith Corona. Schneider markers. Label maker.

I went to bed at 3am, and woke 4 hours later for my flight.

It was time to start the roadshow. The book is not just the words on the paper. It’s the whole experience, the presentation. Like how the way the Apple box glides out before you even hold the phone in your hand and power it on.

I let Big S read it silently. Then I had him read it out loud to me. I snatched the papers from him and let him talk as I began to make corrections to the opening.

I printed out a new first paragraph, then taped it over. Whiteout to edit the rest throughout. Then we we were on our way to dinner with the rest of the brothers.

they say I been talking too much about how I been ******

We hopped out the blacked out. To that new Mexico City spot, the one on the corner of Delancey. First Michelin star loading.

My brother M knows the chef—he knows everyone. For obvious reasons.

Table flooded: beef tartare, crickets, lamb burgers, squash, squid, tostadas, mushrooms, horchata soft serve, chocolate cake, etc.

No manners. Just elbows and heavy exhales.

You know it’s a real feat of culinary abundance when our quintet taps out. Despite repeatedly asking him to slow down, the chef would not relent.

I just remember wanting to be horizontal, but M made me fight through the food coma and talk to the chef.

He told me about his years couch surfing, dropping out of culinary school because he didn’t respect his teachers, working anywhere that would take him.

Another plate came out of the kitchen and he swiped it from the server to point out to us how he was experimenting. Thin slices of carne asada, almost translucent at the edges, fanned over a citrus-dressed summer salad—jícama, shaved fennel, a little mango. He pointed out the cut first, how fine it had to be to take the marinade without getting lost in it. Then the glaze—a light tamarind and lime reduction, brushed just enough to catch the heat. Even as he explained it I could see his gears turning, how he was going to head back and try again.

My manuscript moved around the table, my brother’s snatching it from one another (J the oldest, M the second, me the third, C the youngest). Big S was explaining to them what I had already infused him with.
I explained the process to the chef:

Handwritten → typed on computer → typewritten → handwritten again → performed as spoken word for my house DJ/producer best friend→ transcribed → typewritten.

Oh and typed again in Big S’s office just a couple hours before.

The chef’s eyes widened as I wiped some powder off the page he had in his hand. By this point I was out of my seat, standing next to him.

Yup yup, there was my reverence for the evangelical preacher register. The repetition, the incantation. After all I wrote it primarily by candlelight.

I alluded to the allusion that Big S said I should allude to. Now everyone’s eyes widened (except for Big S who held a wry smile).

The chef was being summoned back.

He turned to me and wished me good luck with the book. Greatest debut ever huh? You got this.

I wished him good luck with the restaurant. Fastest road to a star? You got this.

and I’m sorry, I ain’t got no time to call you

I wish I could paint you more of the weekend.

But there were 3 Os (not all by ourselves). There were 30 hours of sleep total.

So here’s a collage—straight from my notebook and camera roll. No edits, just redactions and labels.

ROMANCE/DESiRE

are you going to call my bluff, or will I call yours?
promise me one day we’ll give up all this wordplay, because the real miracle is that the love was always here 2 stay
“me motiva y me dice que no pare, que tengo que darle, en la música enfocarme”
- that’s all I want, a woman to say to focus on your writing and mean it. forever. Is that too much?
I think we could paint good moving scenes, tableau vivants, me and her
I want to light my Palo Santo and I want her to lick it
You can leave with love
She would love to know that I ended the night reading her letter and looking at her photos
A morning routine in the bathroom—intimacy and insecurity (one and the same no?)
My mind isn’t made up so I’ll let her do it
**** would adore Elizabeth Street Garden, maybe she can come to the city this summer
Give them time and space and pain to convince themselves because once they do—together you will fill the vacuum of fear and longing with _______?
“All Life’s grandeur begins with a girl in the summer”
buy *** a postcard, send ******* a playing card, and what kind of gift for ****?
The way ****** moved next to me while filming in the mirror, write about that
- no no, write about how it made you feel, not just what she was doing

ART/SPiRiTUALiTY

draw a mandala
To see it all is power and pain
work on your handwriting
mini moleskin size, paperback, pulp illustration, cigarette packaging, novella of first 10k words of Campus Fiction, luxurious pilot sold auction style, odds and evens different covers and some words, people buy their favorite number, only 100 copies ($100+ per copy), ticket to our parties/salons
“shadows and dust—I dwell in possibility” (*****’s diary entry)
Keep rewriting the intro until it feels like someone slowly lowering you down into warm water
Fitzgerald just tells the same story over and over and over again—how he won over his wife by fulfilling a grand ambition....yet his stories are always tragic, so does he regret it all? Or he cannot move on, is there no higher high for him?
What is my story I tell over and over? What question am I asking over and over and answering with more and more questions?
Miley did say promote before it’s official so they have no choice but to make it happen
Denzel did say “I’m leaving with something!”
Front row, court side, ring side, on set, first class
Tyler Hays just does whatever he wants his whole life, down to constructing his own tools and look at fulfilled and successful he is—PEOPLE LOVE TYRANTS IN ART
The star knows the ecstasy is in living as the dream, eternal fantasy just out of fingertip reach but real and grounded to him and his
Pacific Gunplay should be the title of the **** story
Also good reminder that 90% of plots are stolen
Just keep asking questions that have questions as answers, that’s all a timeless story is
The longer you can be with the incomplete, the better it will become
I wish to enter into an intimate confidence with the world but also to hold myself closely with Time at arm’s length so that I disappear and leave them all with a holy smoke and mirror…and the echoes of an eternal embrace
“My wish would be that painting were not fiction, but life itself, in order to transform it”
Wrestling with and riding the raw material of life
What is my story I tell over and over? It aligns with the age we are in, the trans humanist future…when you can become anything, what will you choose to be?
It’s the only honest story I can tell because my life is not one of struggling with formation or ascension, but rather stewarding power...and wondering if I am writing myself or discovering myself?
What is the audience trusting you to unveil? What are they trusting you to satisfy?
The beauty of believing in God is there is never any budget, never any limit
God as posture and protection
Light does not need to be searched for
There is no high better than the flow state
Cruel Intentions, such a good bad movie and I can see why she said it was like my book
- Honest virgin versus deceitful slut, eternal battle (inside and out across all of us)

FRiENDS/FAMiLY

The beauty of kicking it with a ****** is there is never any budget, never any limit
Sherpa jacket in the office, ** asking me how I’m so tan
***** looks so stressed, talk to dad about it
**** is going to get hurt real soon, but he doesn’t want to see what’s coming so like a good friend I can only wait to comfort him when it happens
I love that * loves to work out as much as me
Take *** to Silence Please, Pageant Portrait and BDDW gallery
**** hitting on his customers this morning (“I forgot, I was supposed to give you guys a little Christmas special”) lmaooo
**** is like Gatsby, a patron of mine—he keeps me in his apartment, writing away, a living performance art piece for all to observe and collaborate with
- The guy side of ideal traits is done, get more girls to answer honestly
- And try to get guys to answer beyond the obvious
text **** the picture of *** and I
****’s reply lmaooo—some women are so naturally flirtatious that it circles back around to meaning nothing although I suppose I’m projecting because I know I can exude that energy as well
*****’s convo on getting an ED from calorie tracking, fascinating
826 NYC, Straight Street Orlando, Panthera, my big 3 to shoutout
Buy book to leave at *’s to start oral tradition of reading to people like Friday night with **** and her friends
Family gossip isn’t so bad I guess, so long as it’s well intentioned
QUAVO SINATRA
*** raw notes: “she has a fat mirror and she doesnt know it (lol), threw up in my favorite purse, **** is a tattletale (lmao), this place is like a tequila dungeon, he’s so hot but his IG is such an ick, can you believe these guys run their texts through ChatGPT and dont expect me to realize?”

CiTY LiFE

so little sleep, yet more energy than ever
Thursdays at Soho Grand lmao
****** the plug at Waiting On A Friend, he said let’s go play Twister Mister
People really love drunk driving don’t they? I haven’t in so long and I never will again...but I get it. The thrill. It’s fun and the thought of ending it all at that speed. I feel the goosebumps right now.
The drugs don’t do anything...your own brain always shines through (or brings you down if that’s where you are at naturally)
Sopranos episode as a lullaby every night
Read Carrie
Seeing cats up for adoption make me so sad
Beautiful weather this first day of spring
Wet hair, body butter, honks and tourists milling about outside the window, one foot resting on top the other
Last night during Flashing Lights when Kanye said “straight from the page of your favorite author” and * pointed to me
Gym, smoothie, sauna, massage combo is elite
Overheard a girl in line at the coffee shop: “I really want that but I need a reason to get it”
Ask **** tonite about party promoter specifics, have him show you his Apple note to work into tomorrow’s scene experiment
Biking the money tree home, I love New York
Guy who hopped over garbage bags on sidewalk but kept playing harmonica
I understand what **** said about the sex appeal of tall buildings
***** went to Ementa in Lisbon too! also ******** told me to check out Sezane’s shirts