When I first started working in a hospital, just over ten years ago1, someone told me it was like living in a small, strange country.

At the time I probably nodded earnestly, muttered something like “Absolutely. And the toilets are… this way, you said?” before power-walking into a linen cupboard.

But now, years in, I know exactly what they meant.

It has all the markings: a distinct microclimate (arctic in the basement, rainforest near the laundry), a regional cuisine (mostly consisting of leftover birthday cake, toast, and a hauntingly beige meal known only as ‘option two.’) And a local dialect so dense with acronyms it may as well be its own language:

“Can we discuss the MDT recommendation and GBOs for the CYP from CAMHS with AN-R under CPA?” When someone first asked me that, I genuinely thought I was being tested. Possibly for a stroke.

Having developed a degree of fluency, I now know that question translates as: “We’re worried about this teenager. Can we talk about how to help?”

It still drives me mad that we don’t just say that instead.

FTMA. Far Too Many Acronyms.

MGWSMA? My God, Why So Many Acronyms?

ATOOTJAA?N! A Third One Of These Jokes About Acronyms? No!

Hospital’s have dialects within dialects: the gentle, sing-song lilt of the neonatal team, the hushed-but-urgent staccato of intensive care. There are customary rituals: the Biscuit Diplomacy of staff rooms, the way everyone pauses before stage-whispering the word “quiet”, like they’re afraid the gods might overhear and punish their hubris.

One of the strangest rituals in my hospital is the ‘dance of the broken lift’. When the doors jam, as they inevitably do, the choreography never varies. There is a brief, conspiratorial pause. Eyes meet, and it’s tacitly agreed: the largest person present will assume their ceremonial duty of planting both feet, squaring their shoulders, and manually dragging the door closed with all the strength they can muster. Then, as if on cue, everyone does one big jump, in unison.

Newcomers find the ritual deeply unsettling, and rightly so. Heave-ho, then one big jump? That shouldn’t be the system!

Nobody knows why this should work (the success rate is perhaps 40%) and yet, the folkloric faith in Big Jump remains sacrosanct. To the uninitiated, it’s a spectacle both baffling and faintly alarming - like watching villagers perform a centuries-old harvest dance whose meaning has long been lost, but which everyone continues to perform with conviction and solemnity.

The hospital feels like it has its own time zone, too. You can go for hours without glimpsing any natural light, so it’s a place that feels simultaneously suspended in time and completely outside of it. You might walk in at 9 a.m. and suddenly it’s 4:17 p.m. and you haven’t done a wee in all that time (troubling, medically), but when you finally emerge, blinking, into the light, you’ve borne witness to more than should feel possible in a year.

But the main thing is, of course, the people. The citizens! Medical staff, porters, housekeepers, volunteers. The nurses who’ve imagined a thousand sunrises from a ward with too few windows. The porter who calls everyone “duck” and makes faces for the kids who can’t leave their rooms. (Last week, Abdullah, one of the cleaners, accompanied a scared child down to surgery for a procedure he’d been dreading. When they came back, almost three hours later, we asked if he’d been waiting downstairs all that time. “Of course” he said, with a shrug. “I wanted him to see my BIG smile when he woke up!”)

Hospital People can read the mood of a hallway like a second language. Way beyond the hastily-Blu-Tac’d notices on the walls, we’re gleaning crucial information from a silence, a vocal inflection, the quiet “What do you need?” tucked carefully inside a casual “How was your night?”

Because in a hospital you learn, quickly, how to navigate it all. Which ward clerks will lend you their hole-punch, and which would sooner staple your hand to the desk. How to spot the housekeeper who might sneak you a yoghurt when you missed your lunch break. How to quickly read a room still echoing with unwanted news.

More than a collection of buildings, mostly shabbier than would be ideal, a hospital is a whole ecosystem. A little country, full of quiet, everyday diplomacy. Not always safe, or fair, or easy - but once you learn the rules, there comes a moment when you realise: you’re not just visiting anymore.

My moment came on a very cold, January-ish sort of Tuesday (you know the kind), when I answered the phone at the nurses’ station. Not strictly my job, but no one else was there, and it was ringing and ringing and ringing. So I answered.

It was Nataša’s mum, Mirna, sounding panicked.

“Katya! Thank god!”

Always a troubling start.

Mirna knows me. Three of Nataša’s four birthdays have been with us in hospital. One year we’d all worn party hats, even the consultants. The second year she was in intensive care, and for one reason and another the party never got rearranged. The year after that? Pirate bandanas.

Mirna was in a panic, talking so fast I could barely make out what she was saying. Something about her daughter’s new motorised wheelchair being delivered to the hospital today, after months and months of delay. I knew about the wheelchair. We all knew about the wheelchair. Its arrival had been delayed so long it was practically mythologised.

Nataša’s mum speaks English as a third language, and she was speaking ferociously fast. Interpreters are brought in for medical conversations, but there wasn’t an interpreter around at that moment, nor did it seem like there was time to call one.

I cobbled together as much information as I could: no, she wasn’t sure who was delivering the wheelchair. It hadn’t come through our hospital wheelchair service, but instead had been sourced privately - via someone who knew someone who owed someone a favour. And one of those someone’s would be here to drop it off any minute, and they had told Mirna emphatically that they couldn’t stay long.

But her husband’s boss had said no to time off work. (When you have a daughter who has been in hospital for three years, your sick days don’t stretch very far, and Nataša’s dad didn’t have the sort of job that gave him any sick days to begin with.) Mirna’s younger daughter had a temperature, and wouldn’t be allowed on the ward, as it could put patients at risk of infection. So she couldn’t come in. Could someone - anyone - go outside to receive it?

Did I have time for this? Not really. Did I have the details that might let me get it done quickly and efficiently? Certainly not.

There’s a fantastic Polish proverb, often deployed to signal that a situation isn’t your responsibility: Nie mój cyrk, nie moje małpy. In English, it translates to: Not my circus, not my monkeys.

An evergreen expression, it can be a handy reminder to step back. Boundaries are forever being tested in the hospital, and you have to know when to say, “Not my job.” Nie mój cyrk.

But there are times when being a citizen of the hospital means accepting that, for better or worse, these very much are your monkeys.

I was the person who had answered the phone. And I was (hopefully) a person that could help. So I wrote down some hasty notes on a post-it, straightened my proverbial ringmaster’s hat, and set off.

Outside, it was cold enough to make your eyes water, but my coat was seven flights of stairs away, and I knew the lifts would take too long. This wasn’t the moment to gamble on the power of Big Jump! I stepped into the chill, and started scanning the street for a man whose name I’d jotted down - Serjan? Maybe. His car might be black? Unconfirmed. I was sitting on a veritable goldmine of information.

I paced the hospital entrance, instantly shivering, scanning dozens of cars like a deranged traffic warden. Nothing. A man to my left was smoking. A family to my right was unloading their bags. An unfortunate realisation slowly came into focus: scanning the entrance of a hospital for a wheelchair is like looking for a needle in a haystack, but instead of the haystack, it’s just... way more needles. The dreaded needlestack!

So there I was, pacing the entrance like a very stressed meerkat, eyes darting across a sea of cars, when I heard a familiar voice behind me. “Come and see the cards! They look great!”

It was John.

John has been an ambulance driver for more than 30 years. He adores his wife, drinks endless cups of strong, sugary tea, and is powered by a deep desire to be of service. But enough about how great John is for a moment!

Let’s record scratch:

A few weeks earlier, I’d been in the Head of Play’s office, chatting while she wrestled with a teetering stack of handmade cards from a local primary school. They were ‘Get Well Soon!’ cards, made with beautiful intentions, for the children and young people in our hospital. There were vibrant drawings of stethoscopes, smiley-faced stars, and the occasional anatomical mystery. The cards said things like ‘You are strong!’ And, because children are, almost universally, absolutely unhinged, one card proudly declared, in glitter pen, “I hope you don’t die!” You can’t fault the sentiment, but for sure the delivery could use some finessing.

So, as I’m sure you understand, the future of the cards was unclear.

“I can’t just throw them away” she sighed. “But… I don’t think we can give them out?”

We both nodded at the same time, recognising the dilemma. The cards were so sweet, but: a) it would be undeniably weird to give a kid in hospital a Get Well Soon card from a complete stranger, and b) crucially, no kid wants to be reminded that another kid feels sorry for them.

Enter John. I had forgotten all about the cards, when John came up to me in the cafeteria a few days later, with an idea.

“I want to redecorate the inside of my ambulance. If the little’uns do any nice colouring and that, could you save them for me?”

Well!

Would you believe, I might have just the thing!

John’s wife (Eileen) spent hours and hours laminating every single card (I had carefully sifted out the more macabre offerings before handing them over), so they’d be wipeable and thus officially infection-control compliant. John borrowed the laminator from one of the medical secretaries who apparently turned a blind eye to him taking it home because they shared a fierce devotion to the same football team.

And so, because he thought it might make his ambulance feel a little bit friendlier, he decked out the whole interior with glittery hearts and carefully crayon-d teddy bears, and sweetly offered, wobble-lettered wishes - “You’ve Got This!” “You’re amazing!!!” Even the ceiling was totally plastered because, as he thoughtfully pointed out: “the little’uns are often lying down when they’re in here.” He shrugged. “It just makes sense to have the pictures where they can see ’em.”

So, when he called out to me that morning - “Come see the cards!” - I wanted to say yes. I wanted to be delighted! But this was no time for John’s beautiful schemes! I had a mission.

“I’m so sorry, John,” I said, eyes still scanning every car. “I can’t come right now, I’m looking for a man with a wheelchair for Nataša. I think he might be called Serjan? Or at least something that sounds like Serjan, for sure. His car might be black.”

I felt like a total idiot.

And then - of course - the man to my left, mid-drag on his cigarette, looked up and said, in perfect deadpan:

“I’m Serjan. I have the wheelchair.”

He’d been there the entire time.

And here’s the thing: if it hadn’t been for that conversion with John, I would almost certainly have missed him! The chair might’ve disappeared back into the system again, rebooked, delayed, backlogged.

Instead, that afternoon, Nataša got to go outside for the first time in months. The nurses bundled her up, and they wheeled her to the hospital garden. The sun was weak, but it touched her face. They took the time to send her parents a photo.

This is what it means, I think, to be a citizen of the hospital: to be a tiny, moving part of a messy, mind-bendingly bureaucratic, strangely beautiful ecosystem. I’m a music therapist, yes, but sometimes I’m also a wheelchair courier. Or I’m a person who knows where to find a bunch of hand-drawn pictures to help decorate an ambulance. Sometimes I’m just the person who knows where the linen cupboard is, and once, I found myself leading a miniature parade of disorientated visitors down a corridor while holding a papier-mâché fish. No one asked me to do that. But, perhaps more troublingly, no one stopped me, either.

You start to notice what’s missing, and if you can, you try to provide it. Even if it’s not your job. This kind of work exists in the in-between spaces: corridor conversations, shared glances, and little moments of doing-your-bit that never make it into any official record. The serendipity of a well-timed chat, and the never-ending improvisation.

Then one day - without ceremony or signpost - you stop feeling like a visitor.

You look around - at the biscuits and the birthday cakes and the tired eyes and the mad, shimmering courage of it all. You see what it means to stay, and to care, and to keep trying, and you realise:

Yep. You live here now. (Y.YLHN.)

The Cameo

My guest this week is Carolyn Kendrick

What would you love for people to know about your work?

At this point in my career, I feel most comfortable describing myself as a musician, writer, and producer, in that order. I write songs and perform in my own project, I play the fiddle and guitar as a side person for other bands, I make podcasts (like Don’t Call Me Darlin’, You’re Wrong About, First Thirst, and You Are Good), I produce songs and albums for people, and co-run a studio education program called the Gender Equity Audio Workshop with our friend and hero Isa Burke. I like doing a bunch of different things, but they are all related to music and humanity in some way, shape, or form.

What might people be surprised to discover about your work?

I’m very history-oriented! Everything I care about has some element of relating to historical context. Even if it’s about the current day, I still think about how that relates to the threads of time.

What made you/helped you to choose what you do?

My parents, grandparents, and aunts/uncles are all musicians (though very different, genre-wise, from what I do), so music has always been the centrepiece of my life. There has never been a doubt in my mind that it’s at the heart of my desires. I tried to not be a capital M Musician for a couple years and it really did not go well - I got very depressed. I don’t think I have a choice. If I could choose, I’d choose something way less erratic.

What’s your perfect breakfast/lunch for a workday? (What do you actually have for breakfast/lunch?)

Historically, I usually have about three cups of coffee on an empty stomach. However, lately, I’ve been making myself a very LA-coded breakfast, which is a massive kale and spinach smoothie that I drink on my morning walk, and then a breakfast burrito once I get back from my jaunt.

Do you have a set morning routine?

Yes! And it is unwavering. I wake, I feed my cats, make my coffee as strong as humanly possible. I go to my backyard to do my morning pages in the shade of my pomegranate tree. Depending on how much time I have, I might sneak in reading a few pages of a book. I come back inside, light some incense, and I ask a guiding question of the day before pulling 5 tarot cards. (Examples of guiding questions are: What should I remember for today? What can I meditate on for guidance? What can I use to solve _____ conflict I’m currently in?) I write my tarot pull in my journal and a few sentences about what it means to me. I make what my partner Alex calls “my horrendous juice” (green smoothie, he’s more of a berry guy, I like more savory) and tramp around the foothills of the San Gabriel Mountains outside my front door for about an hour before returning to the demands of producing art!

Do you have a dedicated/preferred space for practice or writing music? If so, what does it look like?

I love writing in my little office or in my living room. The only must is that I need to be alone - I can’t have any friends, partners, or family around. This means that my partner and I live separately, right around the corner from each other. For me, turns out solitude is the quickest route to honesty. I struggle with feeling monitored or heard when something is in embryonic form because it embarrasses me.

Preferred tools of the trade? Essential work items?

Thesaurus, rhyme zone, voice memos, and my iphone notes! I keep countless thoughts, musings, lyric chunks, funny (to me) observations in there that are pretty much garbage scraps on their own, but eventually become the fertilizer for many songs, essays, and podcasts.

What’s your favourite thing about your job?

I love that I’m constantly around interesting, vibrant, diverse, challenging people and art. I love that my work requires being in and being good to community. I love that songs make me think about the world and myself in new ways. I love that it is cathartic. I love that the fiddle makes me feel connected ancestrally and culturally. I love that my job is colorful and always changing.

Least favourite?

I hate that my job is always colorful and changing. The freelance dance takes no time off and to hustle requires a grit that I possess but am also exhausted by! I think we would all make better art - and perhaps, more importantly, make decisions that are more in line with our values - if there were more support for artists on a national/global scale.

What do you do to get through days when you just don’t feel like it?

I go on long walks and call my friends. Luckily, all of my best friends also work in challenging artistic fields and know what it’s like to struggle through, so they possess mountains of wisdom that I’m constantly mining.

Do you have a go-to treat to get you out of a slump?

I feel like my slumps tend to be longer scale than short. For example, it’s more likely that I’ll feel like I have an entire year that’s just kind of….. Off. And then I’ll have years that feel completely electric and in line with my entire life purpose. So I wish I could know how to better get out of those mythically large slumps, but when they come in a more day-to-day way, I always feel better after making a quesadilla.

Go-to work sustenance, meal, drink or snack-wise?

In my house, there’s salad season, and then there’s soup season. Every few days, I make a huge batch of one or the other, and then pick on it until it’s gone. Best salad: kale, roast chicken thighs, avocado, homemade croutons, shallots, feta, candied pecans. Best soup: tortilla soup, top with avocado and sour cream and fresh made tortilla chips.

What’s your favourite part of the day?

The morning! When nothing has gone wrong yet. I love my morning routine, and when I’m done with it, that’s when I write.

Least favourite?

3-5 pm, for sure. I always feel exhausted, stretched thin, nowhere near done for the day – bedtime feels a million miles away, and yet morning feels like it was 5 minutes ago. It’s siesta time for a reason, but I sadly do not live in a siesta-friendly culture.

What’s been your favourite failure? One that you learnt a lot from, or one that you can look back and say ‘well I got through THAT, I’m unstoppable!’

To put it diplomatically, I worked with someone for years who holds almost exactly opposing creative values to my own. It created a level of conflict that almost destroyed everything I hold near and dear. It was lowkey traumatic and codependent, but really helped me refine what my creative values are, what my personal and professional boundaries are, and how to identify when they’re being pushed. It’s been huge for learning how to choose what projects to say yes to moving forward, and learning what questions to ask before diving in.

What’s one piece of advice you would give to someone who wants to do what you do?

Buckle up, baby. Unfortunately, one must “choose your hard” because nothing is easy. It’s hard to be a constantly hustling creative, but it leads to deeper meaning and connection that is really almost impossible to access from a “normal” life. (At least for me.) And it’s also hard to choose security and normalcy over being a creative, because it’s hard to plug into a system that is built to extract your labor, not give you meaning and connection. There’s no easy path, so the best thing you can really do is just follow your values. No matter what, it’s going to be a little uncomfortable so you might as well have as much fun as you can carve out.

What’s the best piece of advice someone’s ever given you? (Or worst!)

I think the worst advice I ever got was that I had to choose what niche I would be. The advice was well-intentioned, and in reference to choosing a musical genre to commit to. It came from someone I greatly admire, but I am interested in far too many traditions and disciplines to ever be someone who operates truly within a niche. After that advice, I constantly felt like I was failing because I cared about many things across many disciplines and wanted to incorporate all of them into my artistry. I felt like I was supposed to be only one thing to be digestible to an audience. But I’ll never be one thing - now I am fine with being many different people within my one wild and precious life because trying to narrow it down only made me smaller.

The best advice I’ve ever gotten is to just go. Go to the party, go to the gig, show up to the event. Even if you don’t know anyone and don’t feel comfortable and would rather watch netflix all night. (In fact, maybe especially if those things are true.) By going, that’s how you meet people, get connected, bring yourself more joy and surprises, which to me, are the meaning of life. To have a meaningful life, you have to take leaps of faith - so just go. You can always leave if it sucks.

What are you evangelical about recommending to people?

Bookwise: Bluets, Maggie Nelson. Uses of the Erotic, Audre Lorde. All Fours, Miranda July. Bright Dead Things, Ada Limon. How To Write An Autobiographical Novel, Alexander Chee.

Musicwise: Anais Mitchell, by Anais Mitchell. Young Man in America, Anais Mitchell as well. Anything by The Weepies.

Moviewise: Hunt For the Wilderpeople. Past Lives. Little Miss Sunshine. Magnolia. Beatrix Is Invisible. Parasite. Ladybird. Moonlight. Titanic.

What’s your top tip for getting shit done?

Oof - I don’t know what works for other people. But for me, I’m a list person - I’m typically pretty good at making lists and then crossing things off. If I have no list, I am listless. (Duh.)

Often, if I have to get something done, I go to the library (or a BAD coffee shop - none of this fancy business - the worse the better, it motivates me to get out of there quicker) with my computer and headphones and tell myself I can’t leave until it’s finished. This might not be a healthy approach, but for whatever reason, my brain literally believes I can’t leave, so when I start getting hungry or uncomfortable, my brain is like “ok time to crank this out so I can leave.” And then I do.

Which three songs should I listen to this week?

Same Changes - The Weepies

Learning to Fly - Tom Petty

Please Go Easy With Me - SE Rogie

Find Carolyn on Instagram @carolynbkendrick

Keep up with her goings-on here and here. Beautiful music! A podcast about the history of women in bluegrass! Programs to improve gender equity in audio engineering! It’s all wildly good stuff.

Some Music

And speaking of Carolyn’s beautiful music, the starting point for this week’s playlist was a song called Leela, from her album Each Machine.

I cannot stop listening to this song! And now I pass this potential affliction on to you, free of charge.

You can listen to the playlist here.2

A Poem

I Would Like to be a Dot in a Painting by Miro

By Moniza Alvi

I would like to be a dot in a painting by Miro.

Barely distinguishable from other dots,

it’s true, but quite uniquely placed.

And from my dark centre

I’d survey the beauty of the linescape

and wonder-would it be worthwhile

to roll myself towards the lemon stripe,

centrally poised, and push my curves

against its edge, to get myself

a little extra attention?

But it’s fine where I am.

I’ll never make out what’s going on

around me, and that’s the joy of it.

The fact that I’m not a perfect circle

makes me more interesting in this world.

People will stare forever –

even the most unemotional get excited.

So here I am, on the edge of animation,

a dream, a dance, a fantastic construction,

a child’s adventure.

And nothing in this tawny sky

can get too close, or move too far away.

from The Country at my Shoulder (Oxford University Press, 1993)

Links

I keep coming coming back to this clip of Coty Raven Morris leading a choir rehearsal, and blowing the absolute roof off the place. For any old friends of the katch-up (what a funny thing to write!) it will come as no surprise to you that I LOVED this bit:

“You have three options of what to call me: I’m teaching you who I am, and you teach me who you are, and we say those things with respect.”

@elevatevocalarts

Elevate Vocal Arts on Instagram: "Highlights from Coty Raven Mo…

a single line of Shakespeare contains an ethical universe - I really enjoyed this essay by Naomi Alderman on Shakespeare, AI, the unplumbable* depths of a man’s subconscious hinterland, and the significance of word-choice.

*certainly not a word, but should be? Fun to look at, fun to say! See above.

The Anti-Cosmetic Surgery Essay Every Woman Should Read. Click-bait-y headlines make me so tired, but this one is unfortunately correct. When searching for this essay online, what came up first was an absolute deluge of adverts for all the different ways I should consider re-jigging my sweet round face. Father Karine is right:

If you think about it—actually think about it—for more than 60 seconds, your spirit will break in half like an expired Twix bar.

My friend Misha - a genius musician and former Katch-Up guest3 - recorded his baby daughter singing in the bath and then harmonised it on the piano. The video is mad and beautiful, and I’m not willing to admit how many times I’ve watched it:

@mishamullovabbado

Misha Mullov-Abbado on Instagram: "Orla did some hip singing in…

I long to own a copy of this poster. If you know anyone who knows anyone who knows the artist Maira Kalman, please find out how I can get my mitts on a copy!

And that’s it!

Love,

Katya

You can find all my previous letters here.

I’m about to go in and meet a patient for the first time. She’s five years old, and is new to the ward. New to being in hospital.

I’m lurking outside her room, doing the never-not-awkward thing I do when I’m trying to peer through the window without looking like I’m peering through the window.

I’m scanning first for the immediate stuff: are they awake or asleep? Are their parents in the room? Siblings? Fifteen doctors on a ward round, squished into the room like stethoscope-d sardines?

Second, the person: I’m trying to speedily, surreptitiously scan for clues about who this little person is, and what they care about. Are there any pictures tacked onto the wall? A special duvet cover brought from home? Something — anything — that says: Here’s how to reach me.

But this time, I’d barely begun my lurk before Ellie, the nurse looking after her, popped her head round the door.

“We just have to finish her meds, then she’s all yours.”

Then, lowering her voice to a whisper, “She hasn’t spoken much since she got here. But I think she’ll love music. She’s got two stuffed animals — I reckon they’ll be up for a dance too. Don’t know their names yet.”

Just like that, Ellie hands me a golden key to the little world inside that room. I nod, grateful, and step inside.

She was absolutely right.

Post-session, (we’re talking Disney songs, we’re talking dance routines, led, of course, by her stuffed animals — an alligator and a bear. I copied their moves — under-qualified and overcommitted. They twirled. I twirled! They did high kicks. I did... kicks! They somersaulted. I panicked! We’re talking curtain calls and diva bows for every toy involved) I went to report back to Ellie.

“Just in case it’s helpful” I added, “The bear’s name is Marisa. The alligator is Coco.”

Now, for context, this was around 4pm, and I’d wager that Ellie hadn’t sat down since breakfast.

Here’s a little something you might have never heard before: nurses are so busy! I know, I know. But it goes so far beyond what you’re imagining! It goes so far beyond what I’m imagining, and I see them quite literally every day! They are time-bending, role-shifting, freaky-deaky Swiss-army-knife humans.

(To any nurses reading this: I’m sorry for calling you freaky-deaky. I truly mean it as the highest compliment.)

With this in mind, Ellie would have been well within her rights to have given me the ‘cool story’ nod and cracked on with her fifteen simultaneous jobs.

Instead? She smiled. Rummaged in her pockets for a slip of paper. Then, coming back empty, picked up a pen and wrote on her forearm:

MARISA. COCO.

It’s one tiny example — barely a footnote in a day — but also the whole story. This is one of a million reasons why I love working alongside the nurses at Great Ormond Street Hospital. This is one of a million reasons why they deserve the world.

Happy International Nurses’ Day.

The Cameo

My guest this week is Roisin Dunnett

What would you love for people to know about your work?

I thought about this for a while, partly because I have and always have had more than one ‘work’ (like lots of/ most people). Setting aside domestic stuff, at the moment I am an author and also work in a school library. I think what I really believe (was this even the question?) about work is that it all requires way more ‘time wasting’ than is admitted or allowed. Especially for my writing, but also for the other jobs I’ve had, it’s been absolutely necessary to spend time resting, daydreaming, swanning around, procrastinating, noticing things outside the window etc. Staring listlessly at nothing is a dying art and deserves respect.

What might people be surprised to discover about your work?

I’m not sure there is anything surprising about how I work! When I’m writing I’m spending a predictable amount of time typing and deleting and (see above) staring into space. I think I’m sometimes a bit surprised that I manage to produce anything after what in retrospect seems like a day of walking back and forth from my desk, but I am fairly consistent, so I suppose the bits and pieces add up.

I used to work in bookshops and galleries and people would say: ‘what magical places to work’, and I’d be like ‘you’d be surprised’. But actually I am finding working in a children’s library genuinely as magical as it sounds.

What helped you to choose what you do?

A really brilliant teacher in year 4, natural stubbornness and reading.

What’s your perfect breakfast/lunch for a workday? (What do you actually have for breakfast/lunch?)

I am not a breakfast person. I do not think it is the most important meal of the day. I’m all about dinner, the rest is fuel. To wake up I have a large coffee, which I really really enjoy. When I was pregnant I stopped drinking coffee and I think I genuinely lost my spark.

Do you have a set morning routine?

I wake up the earliest for my current job (6.15) than I ever have for any job in my life (I know I’m lucky in that respect), but I was primed for it because my daughter Taryn gets up most days between 6.30/7am. On a day in the school library I get dressed in the dark so as not to wake anyone up and then sneak around until I’m ready to leave. My old housemate Hannah, who is really really good at small, life enhancing amendments, suggested that on early mornings I GET THE COFFEE POT READY THE NIGHT BEFORE so, fill a moka pot with coffee and water before you go to bed and just put it on the hob in the morning and I highly recommend this. On mornings with Taryn things are a bit more leisurely and we sit together on the sofa and she has her beaker of cold milk and I have my mug of hot coffee and then we kind of collaborate on getting ready to go out, getting dressed, packing the buggy etc.

Do you have a dedicated/preferred space for writing? If so, what does it look like?

Most of my published writing so far was written either at the kitchen table of my old flat or at a trestle table desk in what is now Taryn’s room. Out of the window of that room there is a really good view of the sky and these top floor flats with totally transparent front rooms (beautiful but not that practical surely??) which I really enjoyed looking at while I was working.

Now I am lucky enough to write in the London Library in central London, where I am right now, looking at a London Plane tree through the window. The first time I came here to write it was straight after maternity leave and it was probably one of the only full days I’d had by myself since Taryn was born and I was sitting looking out of the same window I am now, and it started snowing and I felt just extreme relief and gratefulness for the whole situation.

Preferred stationary/tools of the trade? Essential work items?

Laptop. I always have a notebook which used to be essential and I do still use a lot to work things out by hand but I think if I had to now I could do without it. I used to write everything by hand in notebooks and type up later which now seems incredibly labor intensive, though probably (?) a good thing craft-wise.

What are your work hours like? Do you try to create a routine for yourself or is that impossible given the nature of your work?

On a writing day used to be very ‘business hours only’ - I did not do early mornings or late nights. I was very strict about writing days, keeping them regular and not doing anything else when I had planned to work, but with a child as well as another job, that’s no longer possible. So now, like most authors, it’s a lot more about fitting things in when I can. I am very lucky to have school holidays to write in. A lot of my writer friends have struggled to fit their writing practice into hours before work or after childrens’ bedtime and, while that is really admirable I also think it’s incredibly taxing and the dedication it takes to keep producing creative work in those quite ordinary circumstances should not be underestimated.

What’s your favourite thing about your job?

The time to imagine, to read, to study and to be alone.

In the school library, talking to pupils, not just about books but about all sorts of things that are what interesting and concerning them day to day, is really brilliant.

Least favourite?

With writing I don’t think I have a least favourite, although finding out that someone didn’t think your stuff is any good isn’t a great feeling. Maybe that is my least favourite. With being a librarian, how busy it is at a school. I enjoy the work but I wish there was more time for all of us, adults and children, to just chill out. That’s not really how the curriculum is set up, as far as I can tell.

What do you do to get through days when you just don’t feel like it?

I’m quite nice to myself about stuff like that. Sometimes it has to be enough to just turn up. I know this is a cliché that people print on mugs but I am genuinely quite reliant on coffee. When I worked in bookshops and the day was really busy and tiring I sometimes used to go into the poetry section and try and read one poem. This was less about how art can set you free (although obviously I do believe that to some degree) and more about staking out some time for yourself, even in a retail job where you literally cannot leave the space.

Do you have a go-to treat to get you out of a slump?

I enjoy a Peanut Butter Cup or (seasonally) a Creme Egg.

What’s your favourite part of the day?

Near the beginning when you’ve got everything set up and everything (including lunch and dinner) is ahead of you.

Least favourite?

When it’s about 1.5 hours from the end of the writing day and I realise I’ve done fuck all. This can be quite galvanising though and then I sometimes manage to get something done.

What’s been your favourite failure? One that you learnt a lot from, or one that you can look back and say ‘well I got through THAT, I’m unstoppable!’

It’s hard (honestly) to point to an individual failure. My writing has received a lot of rejection and indifference (often justified) over the years and I do think that has toughened me up a bit. I am OK at taking constructive criticism and can bounce back from not getting the response I’ve hoped for. It’s nice to get a gold star and it can be awful when someone hates or doesn’t even register something you’ve put your heart and soul into, but it is helpful, I think, to have a bit of inner resilience to the opinions of others.

A recent failure at my library job was that I spent ages devising an exercise that the kids all hated and which in retrospect I agree with them was a waste of everybody’s time. I felt quite defeated that day but I do think I learned something, and I’m sure it won’t be the last such lesson.

What’s one piece of advice you would give to someone who wants to do what you do?

On writing: definitely do it, and respect your desire to do it and give it space and time and practice. Writing is a craft that you can improve and imagination is a muscle that gets stronger with use. I think writing is something that needs to be done alone but then refining and improving and getting the support to continue requires others: writing friends and groups or classes, informal or otherwise.

I’d say the same things, broadly, about reading, which I find it hard to make time for. I now think a lot about how to get children reading too, and one big thing I want to advocate for is to read TO children, not just when they’re very little but as older kids and teenagers. Maybe adults should read to each other more too. Being read to can be such a pleasure.

What are you evangelical about recommending to people?

The audiobook of Down the Drain by Julia Fox.

What’s your top tip for getting shit done?

Sort of trick yourself, be like ‘I’m just going to look on the website and see how you log in,’ or ‘I’ll just write a couple of bullet points,’ and then keep going for as long as you can face it.

Also if like me you have an insane inbox (21,797 emails, nearly all of them spam) ‘star’ the emails you need to respond to, then when you get a chance to sit down just go to your starred or flagged ones power through as many as you can.

Which three songs should I listen to this week?

I’m suspicious of my own taste in music and would NEVER share my Spotify wrapped so this is quite vulnerable for me:

• Cheers (Drink to that): Rihanna

• Wicked Games: Chris Isaak

• Not a specific song but - Whale Sounds: Whales (Taryn requests this regularly.)

A Line You Have Traced is out now, and available in all good bookshops.

Well actually, I say that, but at the book launch there was such a rush for copies that the shop simply ran out!!!! (And I had two in my bag, hehe)

So, learn from those chumps, and get your copy as soon as today!

A Poem

from North of the Cities, Will o’ the Wisp Books, 2007.

Some Music — and a question!

A recent playlist request: “for the mornings when I’m wrestling my alarm, or making coffee with my eyes half-closed.”

Here’s a morning playlist for you — with love, and duvet-longing solidarity. We can shake our fists, together, at the beautiful nectarine sky.

I’m experimenting with making the big shift away from Spotify. We’re talking CDs and LPs at home1, Bandcamp in the car. But, because you can pry my playlists from my cold dead hands, we’re also talking Tidal, in the hopes that it offers musicians a better deal.2

I’d love to know your thoughts on this. How are you listening to music these days?

Leave a comment

And that’s it!

Love,

Katya

You can find all my previous letters here.

Hello!

I’m slowly recovering my equilibrium after a semi-humbling email experience.

I started out - and I’ll not be criticised for this - by writing ‘Hello!’ We’re all on the same page here: it’s a famously jovial, normal way of starting an email. It’s how this one started, and you were all fine with it!

But now misfortune creeps in.

I can’t entirely account for what happened next, but this is my best guess: my phone screen was a little stickier than would be ideal - probably pawed at by a yoghurt-y little hand one time too many. There was no visible gunk (so sorry for saying gunk just then) but it was lacking that glassy-smoothness necessary, I now realise, for operating a touch-screen phone… without incident.

So I’ve typed ‘Hello!’ (As established: fine) and I’ve copied and pasted in the email address from another browser. At this moment I think my thumb created a light friction (?) on the slightly1 sticky screen, and the result? My phone took on a brief but powerful life of its own. Mere milliseconds was all it took for this newly sentient device to make a much-dreaded autocorrect:

‘Hello!’ became ‘Help!’

And then my phone simply - sent the email.

Subject heading: blank

Help!

End of email.

A professional contact? Oh, certainly!

I followed up hastily with a semi-febrile message in which I tried to laugh it off, and make my sweaty little apologies. Was this the ideal way to begin a professional correspondence? No! To quote myself: Help!

But look, I’m a grown-up: I can cope with the embarrassment of loudly appealing for aid out of fucking nowhere, like a frightened cat exploding out of a back-alley trash can, terrifying a passing tourist. What actually bothered me was that follow-up email because, in making my apologies, I was reneging on a resolution I’d set myself. And to make matters worse, I’d made the resolution mere days before, so to renege as quickly as this? A further humbling!

The resolution was: no more apologies!

Sorry, but it’s something I really have to work on. In messages, specifically. Texts, emails - you know the sort. Unless there has been a true wrong-doing, I don’t want to make them, I don’t want to receive them!

Too many of my conversations these days are cluttered with apologies, both sent and received: for slow replies, for being out of touch, for not being available for this or that. ‘So sorry for my slow reply!’ We yelp in chorus. Which then of course demands the identikit absolution: ‘No worries!’

Yes worries, actually! (The Hakuna Matata lyric that weirdly never made the cut.) We’re all inundated with correspondence these days,2 spending as many hours as god gives us writing ‘I hope this email finds you well’ (when not opting for the simple ‘Help!’ of course) and I reject the premise that we can reply to every message both promptly and with due consideration. It can’t be done!

If, like me, you’re forever scrabbling to keep pace with the conveyor belt of your inbox, apologising might feel like an act of courtesy: a minor self-flagellation as a way of acknowledging the value of someone else’s time. But what would it look like if we just… stopped? Without the apologies batted back and forth, would our messages read as brusque and uncaring? Or - and this is my hope - could their absence be an implicit acknowledgment of the wild and numerous demands on everyone’s time? If we accept the likely facts that everyone is busy, and everyone is doing their best, then by ditching the courtesies, we might actually be doing each other a kindness.

Whenever I receive a message that begins with an apology, or indeed whenever I send a message that begins with an apology, I sigh and think - almost without fail - ‘Oh let us not be little bitches to one another.’ This is a line from one of my all time favourite poems - Having Already Walked Out on Everyone I Ever Said I Loved by Hera Lindsay Bird. She continues:

Oh let us not be little bitches to one another

Life is hard enough as it is

Life is hard enough and fast enough

And there is nothing in this world worth doing

But shaking our heads in awe

Life is hard enough and fast enough! Maybe I should start more of my messages with a simple nod towards that truth —

Help!

— And just leave it at that?

The Cameo

My guest this week is Misha Mullov-Abbado

What would you love for people to know about your work?

I am so lucky to have a job that involves music, which is my favourite part of life. I thrive off the constant juggling between different areas of music-making - performing in other people’s projects, playing jazz standards, writing music, recording myself for other people, recording other people for my own projects, and producing. Almost all my friends are people I have met through doing one or many of the above and I love that very much.

What might people be surprised to discover about your work?

It actually takes me a lot of effort to listen to and discover music that I don’t yet know, partly because I’m lazy and partly because I love re-listening to music I know really well. I find it really hard to find the motivation to practise improvising, so I secretly love having a technically challenging gig with specific repertoire to work towards.

Preferred tools of the trade? Essential work items?

A piano, manuscript paper, my laptop and headphones.

What’s your favourite thing about your job?

The fact that I get to make so much different music, and the wonderful people I know because of it.

Least favourite?

Even though I love the variety, the irregularity of my schedule means I struggle to get into a routine with sleep. Mornings are a struggle.

What do you do to get through days when you just don’t feel like it?

When I’m really busy with rehearsals, travelling, and gigs then I know I just have to push through, but I try and look ahead in my diary to make sure I can block off some time afterwards to rest and unwind.

Do you have a go-to treat to get you out of a slump?

Going for a walk. Being outdoors and moving almost always helps. As for treats, there are a number of distractions that will be like a quick escape for a bit (such as YouTube channels about trains that I follow) and as long as I don’t overdo it I tend to feel better afterwards.

Go-to work sustenance, meal, drink or snack-wise?

A fizzy drink like ginger cordial with sparkling water will hit the spot, and usually satisfies the itch of wanting a beer.

What’s been your favourite failure? One that you learnt a lot from, or one that you can look back and say ‘well I got through THAT, I’m unstoppable!’

I can think of a very difficult period which came from my failure to regulate how much work I take on. I had a patch when I felt very overwhelmed with how much music I was doing for other people, and I needed to learn to say no. I found saying no to people so hard, but I had to do it so that I could look after both my career and my mental health.

What’s one piece of advice you would give to someone who wants to do what you do?

Make sure you’re doing projects where you can be you. Since realising I needed to streamline my workload, I prioritise things that use my full skillset.

What’s the best piece of advice someone’s ever given you? (Or worst!)

When I was 20 I was playing with Paul Clarvis - a brilliant drummer that I now work with a lot - and he asked me whether I cared more about sounding good or making other people sound good. I still think about that - it’s so important for any musician (but especially jazz drummers or bassists) to think about how your playing is coming across in the bigger picture, instead of trying to show off or do something flashy to try and get people’s attention.

What are you evangelical about recommending to people?

This is a bit specific, but so many string players who do loads of gigs where they need to be amplified don’t own a DPA clip-on microphone, and they’re worth every penny. I always keep one in my bass case, and while for jazz often just the pickup on the bass is fine, having a mic gives so much more of an acoustic sound.

What’s your top tip for getting shit done?

Make a list, if possible by hand, of what you want to get done that day. Then enjoy the endorphin rush as you cross items off the list.

Which three songs or pieces of music should I listen to this week?

1. Ella Fitzgerald’s It’s Only A Paper Moon. I heard this a few years ago and can’t get enough of the backing male vocal singers that come in half way through.

2. Abel Selaocoe’s Ka Bohaleng. One of the grooviest pieces of music in 11 I know.

3. Danish String Quartet’s Ye Honest Bridal Couple - Sonderho Bridal Trilogy Part I. This opening track of their iconic album Wood Works is so heartwarming and touching, and enough to totally change my mood if I listen when I’m feeling down.

Misha has made a beautiful new album with singer-songwriter/violinist Alice Zawadzki and multi-instrumentalist Fred Thomas. It’s called Za Górami and it’s out this month with ECM Records!

I really love the trio’s description of their process making this album: ‘[…] striving to be both free and controlled, to tread softly and to summon the night.’

Je Suis Trop Jeunette is currently my favourite track, but then I listen again to Los Bilbilikos and how could I have been so bold to choose?

You can get tickets here for the album launch at Kings Place on November 23rd.

Oh my god I just found this video from when Misha and I were tiny babies and played in a band together! (With Rob Slater on trumpet, Merlin Sheldrake on accordion, Ben Pennington on trombone, Ed MacDonald on drums and Arjun Kingdon on violin. Arjun couldn’t make it the night this video was taken, and was heroically replaced at the very last minute by Eugene Feygelson.)3

We never did find out the name of this song, so we have forever called it ‘New Tune.’ Do you know what this song is called? Help us solve this mystery! Our WhatsApp group is divided to this day!

I sent this video to the gang yesterday, and we were all overcome with missing each other. The problem is (and it is a problem), the band includes two medical doctors, one biologist and author, one conservationist, one archaeologist and teacher, one mega-in-demand musician, and… me. As a result, the gods of scheduling are not on our side. Life!

A Poem

You Want a Social Life, with Friends

by Kenneth Koch

You want a social life, with friends.

A passionate love life and as well

To work hard every day. What’s true

Is of these three you may have two

And two can pay you dividends

But never may have three.

There isn’t time enough, my friends—

Though dawn begins, yet midnight ends—

To find the time to have love, work, and friends.

Michelangelo had feeling

For Vittoria and the Ceiling

But did he go to parties at day’s end?

Homer nightly went to banquets

Wrote all day but had no lockets

Bright with pictures of his Girl.

I know one who loves and parties

And has done so since his thirties

But writes hardly anything at all.

from Straits (Knopf, 1998)

Some Music

I promised to start making playlists on request, so here I am: making a playlist on request!

Sam has kicked things off, and beautifully: ‘I’d love some music for when I’m working at home. I want to feel calm and motivated and less scrunched up.’

What a perfect brief! Sam, for you: some music for working, and for unfurling.

You can find it on Spotify here.

Do you have a Playlist Theme Request? I’m all ears!

You can even use this handy button:

Leave a comment

And that’s it!

Love,

Katya

You can find all my previous letters here.

Share

People talk a lot about the various sacrifices and indignities of motherhood. And my god they’re right to! Sleep is ever-elusive, nursing bras are profoundly unflattering, and it’s frankly extraordinary how much food I might find in my eyebrows at the end of any given day. But for me, one of the most mournful sheddings-of-the-self has been the relegation from my chosen seat on the bus - top deck, front seat1 - to the cursed, squished-in pushchair section. When you’ve got the best seat in the house, you are the irrefutable king of the bus. You can, should you wish, pretend to be the driver! Beep beep! And, crucially, you don’t end up in situations like this….

So there I am, on the bus, wedged in the cattle pen. It’s the killer combo: relentless rain all afternoon, a jam-packed bus. I feel acutely aware of the space I’m taking up with my pram; my fellow travellers are nose-to-nose and damply furious. Then, as the bus grinds to a stop, a young woman comes hurtling down the stairs. (Was she on the Top Deck Front Seat? We can’t rule it out.) As she flies into view, I happen to notice that she’s holding the most extraordinary bright blue plate. Marbled azure glass, flecked with gold.

Then suddenly - she wasn’t.

There was an almighty shattering sound, and shards of blue glass scattered across the floor.

I see the plate-dropper’s mouth open in a shocked, silent O and without pausing to think I immediately start scrabbling around on the damp, filthy bus floor to help find the pieces. I’m gathering them up by the armful, in a moment of uncharacteristic optimism. Perhaps she could still put it back together? Seems unlikely, but hey, I’m no ceramicist!

The scene that follows unfolded in slow motion…

As I’m picking up the pieces, shard by shard, I grow increasingly aware of something disconcerting. There’s an unmistakeable tack between my fingers. The plate is… sticky?

It was at this moment that I realised the plate wasn’t a plate at all.

It was, instead, an enormous disc of what I can only assume was beautifully decorated sugar glass. And this once-beautiful thing, a delicate piece of undeniable craftsmanship, had combined with the puddly-muck on the floor of the bus to form a sort of blue and grey… toffee. At this point, the woman, this absolute chaos-monger, looks around with eyes (ironically) as wide as plates, gives me a forlorn look and an apologetic, thankful nod, and leaps off the bus. Gone.

There was no time to unpack what had happened, but with hindsight I have nothing but questions. Why was she carrying an enormous piece of blue sugar glass? And why hadn’t this seemingly precious, demonstrably fragile thing been wrapped up properly?? We are forced merely to speculate. The only certainty available to me in that moment was that I was bedraggled as a wretch, pram in tow, and was now coated from finger to forearm in bright blue caramel. Like a godforsaken cross between Winnie-the-Pooh (elbows deep in the honeypot, as per usual) and, let’s be honest, a Smurf.

As other passengers became aware of my predicament, most studiously ignored me (fair enough actually), and one lady held out a single, slightly furry tissu. A true kindness from her, but the thought of cleaning up Sticky with Dry?? No. A sensory hell. I’m shuddering even now just thinking about it! I then realised that one of the smaller indignities of motherhood could now be my salvation: I’m never knowingly more than a metre away from a Wet Wipe. But now a predicament. I was packing wipes, sure, but how to delve in my bag without creating yet more blue horror? My only option was to humble myself further, and ask a stranger to rummage in my bag.

Having agreed to the quest, this passenger (the real hero of the tale) paused mid-search, assessing both my situation and the contents of my bag, and said, not unkindly: ‘At least you must be used to holding sticky things?’

An extraordinary thing to say to a stranger, certainly! But sir you were not wrong.

A Poem

A Poem for Someone Who is Juggling Her Life

by Rose Cook

This is a poem for someone

who is juggling her life.

Be still sometimes.

Be still sometimes. It needs repeating

over and over

to catch her attention

over and over,

as someone who is juggling her life

finds it difficult to hear. Be still sometimes.

Be still sometimes.

Let it all fall sometimes.

from Notes From a Bright Field (Cultured Llama, 2013)

The eagle-eyed among you, with memories far better than mine, may remember that I shared this poem back in 2018.2 I hope you’ll agree that it felt too apt not to warrant a repeat appearance.

It needs repeating

over and over

The Cameo

My guest this week is Natasha Hodgson3

What would you love for people to know about your work?

I would love them to know about it at all, so what a fantastic opening question. I am a bit all over the place with the things I make - I wrote and was in a spooky/sexy/funny podcast series called The Sink for BBC Sounds. I co-wrote a musical called Operation Mincemeat that I was also in, though I am not anymore, other people do it now. I make other silly podcasts with my friends Kill The Beast. I recently started a Substack called It’s All Good Stuff where I recommend things that I like. And I am currently in a legal battle with my sponsor, a difficult yoghurt company whose expectations of my content delivery differed vastly from my own, so though I do believe intensely in the product (“so yoghurty, your feet will fly like Pegasus”), I will not be promoting it here.

What might people be surprised to discover about your work?

I wrote and performed the song for the 2020 Lidl Christmas advert. Deep pandemic years. It was feral from beginning to end. We were all just doing what we could back then.

What made you/helped you to choose what you do?

I was always fascinated by comedy, particularly British comedy - I watched a lot of it on the telly with my family when I was little, we grew up eating our tea bonding over The League Of Gentlemen, Nighty Night, Monkey Dust, I Am Not An Animal, Fawlty Towers, The Office, Jam, the Mighty Boosh - it was an amazing time to love laughing. I just sat there with my family with us all laughing away thinking “this please, I want to do this”

What’s your perfect breakfast/lunch for a workday? (What do you actually have for breakfast/lunch?)

If I’ve managed to sort out an item of fruit and something involving an egg (cooked), I’m unstoppable.

Do you have a set morning routine?

2 years ago I signed up for “miniature dachshund puppy” updates on the Pets4Homes website. There is no way I am getting a miniature dachshund puppy. I have a completely different dog, got him a year ago. I can’t get a dachshund, they shed and one of my best friends is allergic to dog hair. But I can’t bring myself to get rid of the update. So every day, I get up, and sadly delete the daily email from Pets4Homes about the latest in miniature dachshund puppies. And then I go about my business.4

Do you have a dedicated/preferred space for writing? If so, what does it look like?

I’ve never been in a living situation yet that means I can have An Office, but that’s the dream. For now it’s mostly whatever sofa or bit of table is tidy. Currently the house I’m living in just has one big room downstairs, which the dog is also in, and that’s no good. He’s not a good colleague. He makes a lot of noise and it throws me off and I shout “I’m trying to be the voice of a generation!” and he barks at me to throw him the ball. It’s not a relationship of equals.

Preferred stationary/tools of the trade? Essential work items?

I don’t mind working in silence, but I prefer some music to be on: but specifically careful serious piano music. I listen to the same two Philip Glass albums over and over again - any music with lyrics and I can’t concentrate, I end up shouting “I’m trying to be the voice of a generation!” and Dua Lipa doesn’t care. Between her and the dog it’s amazing I get anything done at all.

What are your work hours like? Do you try to create a routine for yourself or is that impossible given the nature of your work?

I like to say that I have 4 good hours of writing in me on any given work day. After that, it’s all slop. Whether that’s true, I’ll never know, but at least it means I can stop after four hours. When I am itchy and furious at myself, the pomodoro technique is the only thing to settle down the toddler in my brain. I like writing a lot, my friends and I call it - more loftily than we should - “THE BURDEN”, in that you wake up with a weight on your brain, and it lifts when you write something. I expect this is true of a lot of these types of jobs.

It’s something that was very hard about being in the musical for so long. It was so tiring, for both body and mind, that I just didn’t have any reserves left to write anything good - so THE BURDEN was very rarely lifted, and that made it difficult to live in my body from time to time. Performing every night did help make me feel like I was still at least doing something, but it’s a different kind of burden lift. It’s probably some form of mental illness, but who has the time.

What inspires you? (Name 1-3 things if that makes this massive question easier!)

Watching classic films. Those things are great!

Going to the Edinburgh Fringe - I know we should all have given up on this terrible boyfriend by now but we can’t, we just can’t, it’s the most alive you can be

I find video games very inspiring, in that I cannot fathom making them, how would you even start, and I think that lack of envy or jealousy means I can just purely look at them going WOW. WOW??? Oh man WOW.

What’s your favourite thing about your job?

The ability to make sense of my life and the world through writing down situations that I think are funny

Least favourite?

When I’m performing, I miss writing, when I’m writing, I miss performing. What a situation.

What do you do to get through days when you just don’t feel like it?

It depends on what I’m not feeling like getting through. When I’m on a writing kick, it’s the promise that if I do a COUPLE MORE HOURS (using pomodoro, tricks your baby brain into basically believing you’re doing no work at all) - I can eat a delicious meal. There is nothing better or less complicated than a delicious meal. It fixes everything for me. However, if it’s while I’m doing a lot of performing, and your Delicious Meal windows are compromised, it is more difficult. I find pushing through performing comedy when I am sad, or a bit sick, or frustrated very hard. But you do feel proud of yourself at the end, and everyone claps, which is nice. I also think to myself: you are doing what you dreamed of doing, you ungrateful toad. You want to go back to financial copywriting? You miss those days?? You want to head back into recruitment marketing?? You want to lead the team meeting??? And that tends to shut me up.

Do you have a go-to treat to get you out of a slump?

I honestly believe there is no trouble in my life that a huge bowl of pesto filled-pasta, covered in cheese, a cup of tea and an episode of Peep Show on cannot solve. In my head just now it’s the one where Big Suze orders the very expensive bottle of wine “A barolo is always nice?” I’m laughing just thinking about it

Go-to work sustenance, meal, drink or snack-wise?

Oh no I answered it above

What’s your favourite part of the day?

What I love is when it’s 1pm, lunchtime, time to open some crisps and I’ve done 3 hours of brilliant work already. How often does this happen? Irrelevant

Least favourite?

It’s 7pm, I’ve done no good work, it’s getting darker every second and the crisps are all finished

How do you define a good/successful day?

I feel like I have SUPREMELY covered this

What’s been your favourite failure? One that you learnt a lot from, or one that you can look back and say ‘well I got through THAT, I’m unstoppable!’

Too many to count. In our musical there’s a number where we, without warning, come on dressed as Nazis. Full swastikas, suited and booted, everything. It makes sense when we start singing - don’t worry guys! It’s funny! - but sadly, one show, the music just didn’t start. There was an issue with the track, and it just… never came on. We were standing there, in silence, in bright light, inexplicably dressed as nazis, in front of a hundred people. And let’s not forget it was the day Mark Gatiss was in the audience. Honestly, whenever it looks like anything Quite Bad is going to happen, I look down and think “at least I am not covered in swastikas, and Mark Gatiss isn’t watching.”

What’s one piece of advice you would give to someone who wants to do what you do?

Only do it as long as it’s still the best fun in the world. Because it’s very very impossible. And it grinds even the best people down. Without immense financial support, industry contacts and phenomenal good luck, it’s almost fucking impossible to make money enough to live. It’s not impossible! We only had one of those three! It can be done! But it took us ages. Ages and ages and years and we didn’t go on holiday or have nice things for a decade. But we loved it, we were having the best fun, so it didn’t matter. Find people you want to make laugh and make them laugh until you want to do something else. And that’s fine!!!

What’s the best piece of advice someone’s ever given you? (Or worst!)

I still remember the worst advice I ever got, it was at university in a creative writing module that I had just started, and the man running it, in the very first session, said slowly and proudly: “don’t write what you know. Write what you don’t know.” And even though I was about 19, and incredibly suggestible, I remember the visceral feeling of “..... what the fuck are you talking about”. Later we had to write a story from the perspective of the carpet. Awful.

What are you evangelical about recommending to people?

The audiobook of Song Of Spiderman: The Inside Story Of The Most Controversial Musical In Broadway History.

What’s your top tip for getting shit done?

Imagine how much the Burden shall Lift

Which three songs should I listen to this week?

1. Kaleidoscope by Chappell Roan

2. She Used To Be Mine, from Waitress

3. Stay Gold by First Aid Kid

Some Music

A playlist for being still:

Any Other Business?

News! The very best Kate Young has written a novel! It’s a sexy gay romcom, joyful and gorgeous and heartfelt and FUN, and consider this the newsletter version of me urgently pressing it into your hands. To get your mitts on a copy at once, you can find it at: Waterstones! Gay’s The Word! Bookbar - my beloved local bookshop! Or from your beloved local bookshop, best of all!

You can also read her Katch-Up Q&A here, from before her novel was even a twinkle! In those days she was merely an award-winning food writer and cook. Some people, honestly.

Lastly, to the lovely people who’ve been in touch - thank you for the nudges! I really want to make more time to write to you. I’m writing this while my son is sleeping, wilfully ignoring my Sisyphean To-Do list, but still pausing every so often (so often) to peer at the blue-glow of the baby monitor screen. My already mole-like eyes are flickering from laptop to monitor and back again, screen to screen to screen. Focus is… elusive. I’m typing away, but then he’s lying right in the corner of his cot, nose pushed against the bars into a snout! That is both undeniably hilarious, and troubling. It certainly doesn’t look comfortable? But who am I to be a backseat sleeper? As discussed, I seek not the back seat!

Be still sometimes.

Oh yes, right.

Be still sometimes. It needs repeating

over and over

I’m juggling my life, as, I’m sure, are you. Spinning lots of plates; dropping them left and right. (Maybe that’s just me.) Time to try and let it all fall sometimes.

More of that. Less, ideally, of scratting around on the bus floor, picking up the pieces. It’s not quite as poetic, for one thing.

Love,

Katya

1

One of my great joys in this life is getting a text from a friend saying ‘Top Deck Front Seat! Beep beep!’ Double points if it comes with a picture of your feet resting happily by the window. QUADRUPLE points for the text I got last week, purely for spookiness reasons, because it came with a photo of me - spotted in the wild!

She got her phone out to send the Top Deck Front Seat bulletin, looked out of the window and (from her mighty vantage point) saw me in the street, as though summoned!!! AND it was my birthday that day! I was in a neighbourhood I rarely go to, she was only in London for the day, and there we were. Don’t you love it when the world feels so small and perfectly connected like that?

4

You can find all my previous letters here.

Subscribe

It all started with a can of Febreze.

For the past six months or so, most people who’ve been to my house have found themselves asking the same question:

‘Did you know there’s a [insert any number of random objects here: baking tray / tuning fork / tub of hand cream / packet of hot dog buns] on the ledge by your front door?’

The reason for this - and my smiling nod by way of response - is that I have fallen in love with an app that encourages you to give things away.

It began when I was rootling around in an overcrowded cupboard, and found a can of air freshener that I simply couldn’t account for. The metal bit around the cap was beginning to rust, so it had obviously been in there for a while. Maybe it belonged to the people who lived here before us? Who knows. But festering too long, certainly, for anything promising the freshness of a Spring Meadow.

I shrugged and went back to wrestling with the pile of towels, cleaning supplies and (let’s be honest) misc that was threatening to eat my entire arm.

‘The problem’ I grumbled to myself, ‘is that the cupboard is too full.’

[This was true.]

‘But... I definitely need every single thing in here.’

[This was not true.]

Seized by a sudden and irrepressible need for action, I identified the sole piece of low-hanging fruit, marched up the stairs, and - with uncharacteristic decisiveness - threw the Febreze into the kitchen bin.

If this was a film (and what a film!) the camera would now hover over the bin. Then, moments later, you’d see me skulk back into the shot, rustle around in the bin, and retrieve the can.

My thought process was this: Who am I to throw away a FULL can of air freshener, like some sort of medieval king??? A Febreze today, whole legs of chicken over my shoulder tomorrow!

It was at this moment that I remembered my friend telling me about a neighbourhood sharing app called Olio: it had started out as a way of sharing food that would otherwise go to waste, and you can now use it to re-home quite literally anything!

A rusty can of Febreze felt like a good test of this premise. I posted a photo and my location, and sure enough! A request within MINUTES! She’d come by that morning, but timings uncertain, so could I leave it outside? Needless to say, I was thrilled.

Fast forward about an hour. Ben and I are in the living room: Ben is standing at the window that looks out over the street. I’m cross-legged on the floor, invisible from street level.

Ben: ‘There’s a woman walking towards our flat - are you expecting anyone?’

Me: ‘[overexcited] The woman from Olio! For the Febreze!!!’

Ben: ‘ … I don’t know at all what that you mean by that. But… fine.’

As she approached, Ben waved and gave a thumbs up.

In ordinary circumstances? Absolutely nothing wrong with that. But for context, Ben had been filming something at the time that meant he had a 19th century-style moustache, and he was wearing a tank top. Does it seem ideal for a tall, be-vested, moustachio’d man to be standing at the window, apparently waiting to give thumbs ups to unknown women in the street? No sooner had my relationship with Olio begun to blossom, would it be over; flagged on the app as some sort of local undesirable?

Only one way to find out. A few hours later, tentative but emboldened by the Febreze triumph, I made my second post: one (1) unopened packet of salami.

The requests are flooding in! First come, first serve? You’ve got to.

As the mystery recipient approaches, I can’t believe my eyes: it’s the same woman!!!!

9am: Febreze. 3pm: Salami. I have no further questions for this itinerary.

Did she come back for the salami or was it for a chance encounter with a moustachioed stranger? More likely, she was just having the weird sort of day that only a can of Febreze and a packet of salami could fix. A mystery for the ages.

You’ll be glad to know that since then, my Olio use has gone from strength to strength. I mean, the things you can give away! A tangle of random cables, advertised as such? Yes! Three loose shelves? Instantly. If you post even the most shamefully abandoned plants, forlorn and withered beyond recognition, multiple green-thumbed nymphs will write to you, humbly requesting the opportunity to nurse them back to health. Earlier this week I gave away a half full packet of iron tablets… to someone else called Katya!!! Thrilling.

Some of the collections have been unexpectedly moving: The man who wanted an assortment of baby proofing bits, because his grandson was coming to stay with him for the first time. Jane, who picked up a tin of coffee, and told me she was going around her local area, gathering all the things needed for putting together a birthday tea for her mum’s 90th. The lovely Swedish woman who collected a pregnancy book and, upon receipt, just looked at me and said ‘I’m terrified! Were you?’ I told her yes, I was too, and we had a little hug in the street.

No hug from the iron-tablet-Katya, but certainly a nod of shared understanding: one wan, anaemic Katya to another.

My own frenzied clutter-purging aside, it does seem like Olio is broadly A Good Thing, on a wider scale. As of this year, Olio users have shared 25 million portions of food with their neighbours! They also have a ‘Food Waste Heroes programme’, where they train people to collect and redistribute food from catering companies and businesses like Pret A Manger and Costa, scooping up all the food that would be otherwise headed for the bin.

There’s a lot of love in my heart for the man who came to my house to pick up some shelf brackets, and told me he’d just done his big weekly cafe sweep, so would I like a sausage roll and/or a prawn mayo baguette, as a thank you?

I might’ve taken him up on the offer, if he hadn’t told me he was then headed for a food bank drop-off - that prawn mayo would’ve turned to ashes in my mouth.

My own code when it comes to Olio is that I don’t post anything that could be given to a charity shop. Almost all of my most-worn clothes have been faithful charity shop finds, and beyond that - I just like that they exist. But most charity shops have (very reasonable) limits on what they’ll accept as donations, and this is Olio’s real time to shine. For example: I doubt many charity shops would be happy to receive a lone CD case. But somebody, somewhere, thought yes! This is just what I needed: to give my loose CD a friend!

It may not have escaped your notice over the years that I’m a sentimental guy, and nowhere is this more apparent than my incorrigible hoarding of treasures. With this in mind, I’ve so far only dared use Olio for purging purposes. (Gotta make space for more treasures!) But rarely has a day gone by where I didn’t think about one particularly majestic find: Cow of the world painting.

I think I was particularly enchanted by the humble simplicity of the description: ‘Painting of the world, on a cow. Not my handiwork.’

To this day, I have so many questions. How did this Meisterwerk come to be?? How big is it? We’ve been given no dimensions, and the photo gives nothing away for scale, so I have to assume that Cow of the World is simply enormous. And if - as he takes great pains to make clear - it wasn’t Felix [the owner of CoTW] who wrestled this bovine miracle into being, then whose was the mind behind it?

I like to imagine the artist felt like Michelangelo did when he was asked (so the story goes) about sculpting his David, and apparently replied : ‘It’s simple. I just remove everything that is not David.’

Mystery artist: ‘It’s simple. I just paint NOTHING that isn’t the cow of the world.’

Was ‘not my handiwork’ a simple passing of the buck? Or - and this is my preferred version - was his pre-emptive rejection of any possible credit, beyond that of the mere custodian, an act of true humility?

There can only be one certainty: sometimes this world is just too weird and beautiful to believe. Emblazoned on a cow, or no.

(I had wondered whether this newsletter would read like sponsored content, and you might all think I was in the pocket of Big Olio. But I think we can all agree that as ad campaigns go, with the slogan ‘Sometimes this world is just too weird and beautiful to believe. Emblazoned on a cow, or no.’ the app pretty much sells itself.)

The Cameo

My guest this week is Monica Heisey.

Photo by Rachel Sherlock

What’s your job title/profession?

I’m a writer and sometimes a comedian.

What’s your perfect breakfast/lunch for a workday?

I love a toasted English muffin with some peanut butter and a few raspberries squished on top, or a green smoothie. There is something very appealing about cramming five servings of fruit and veg in before 11.

(What do you actually have for breakfast/lunch?)

If I’m working from home I’ll have one of the things I described above. If I have to be somewhere in the real world before 10:30, it’s coffee and a protein bar on the train.

What’s your alarm sound?

The default one that came with my iPhone.

Do you have a set morning routine?

My mornings vary a lot—I wake up between 8 and 9:30. I throw treats around for my cat to chase (she can’t go outside because of medical condition, so we have to bribe her into exercise indoors). I do emails while I eat my breakfast and then I try to get my shit together to be writing by 10:30.

Do you have a dedicated/preferred space for writing? If so, what does it look like?

I’ve lived in so many crappy flatshares that I can basically write from anywhere. I work in bed a lot, and in the afternoons I try to decamp to a second location so I’m not just in my house all day becoming isolated and strange.

Preferred stationary/tools of the trade? Essential work items?

Moleskine has me in a chokehold. I always have a large notebook full of unlined pages for all the lists I make on the go. I have several to do lists on the go at any given time, digital and physical. Otherwise it’s just me, my laptop, and caffeine.

What inspires you? (Name 1-3 things if that makes this massive question easier!)

Reading other people’s work; seeing others reading on the Tube; seeing people continue to make art after personal or professional failure.

What’s your favourite thing about your job?

The freedom to set my own schedule most of the time. The ability to spend a day in bed watching movies or reading in a cafe and call it work.

Least favourite?

Sometimes I have to have my photo taken and I find this very unpleasant.

What do you do to get through days when you just don’t feel like it?

It is an enormous privilege of my job that when I really don’t feel like it… I don’t have to do it. I’ve actually found it saves me time overall to take a full day off when, for whatever reason, nothing is Coming. I’ve tried to push through, and you just end up sitting at your computer for an entire day, spine and brain atrophying in real time. Much better to take the day, nourish your brain and bod if you can, and try again tomorrow.

Do you have a go-to treat to get you out of a slump?

I like to treat myself to a little browse of unrealistic house listings when I’m really stuck. Nothing like a bit of fantasy real estate to motivate you to get back to work. My workday is sponsored by The Modern House.

Go-to work sustenance, meal, drink or snack-wise?

I like to take a big long break to make lunch at about 2 or 3. It can be a plate of assorted bits (salami, a babybel, some veg and dried fruit and nuts) or a sandwich or big salad or bowl… the meal itself is less important than the act of getting up, putting down the phone and computer and puttering around the kitchen putting it together and then eating it. A good way to regroup/break up the day.

How you define a good/successful day?

It’s hard to feel like my work is “finished” on a given day, so it’s always nice to complete something - a full episode, a chapter, a treatment - that I can then send to someone else. Doing this really makes me feel like I have permission to shut the computer. It’s your problem now!

What’s been your favourite failure? One that you learnt a lot from, or one that you can look back and say ‘well I got through THAT, I’m unstoppable!’

I think I’m in the middle of it. Will report back!!!

Any hot tips for the old work-life-balance conundrum?

I do not have any balance in either area. I think very flexible work can be a blessing and curse in this way—on the one hand, my life can fit around my work however I would like it to, on the other hand, my work can creep into my life very, very easily, and if I’m not careful it can take over.

Do you have any hobbies/passions outside of your work?

I love weight lifting, spin classes, and cooking. I’m increasingly passionate about anything that occupies both my hands because it means I can’t be on my phone.

What’s one piece of advice you would give to someone who wants to do what you do?

Read and watch a lot. The first step to making anything you like is to build up your own taste levels, understand what you think is good or bad or smart or funny, and why. The next step is being generous with yourself when your early efforts do not meet your own taste levels. (This is very hard.)

What’s the best piece of advice someone’s ever given you? (Or worst!)

I did a panel about getting into TV writing once, and another member of the panel said to new writers: “A lot of people are funny. Be professional.” This is very boring and very good advice! Being funny is one part of being a comedy writer, but so is showing up on time, being prepared, being good in the room and supportive of your colleagues. The worst advice I ever got was “write drunk, edit sober.” Do not do this.

What’s your top tip for getting shit done?

It doesn’t need to be perfect, it just needs to be finished. Just get it down and send it out, you can fix it later!!

• Follow Monica on Twitter: @monicaheisey and Instagram: @monicaheisey

• Buy her book! Really Good, Actually is brilliant (my opinion, but widely corroborated) and an international bestseller (objective fact). And it came out in paperback earlier this week! So you haven’t a reason in the world not to buy it.

  (Personally? I hate a hardback. Can’t get on with them. But I bought THIS book in hardback. I could pretend it was for reasons of friendship, but really it was just because I couldn’t wait to read it.)

Some Music

I wanted to make a playlist on the theme of Cow of the World. For a theme open to so many interpretations, I have opted for this one: beauty immeasurable.

My friend Jenna sent me the first song - Stacy, In Her Wedding Gown (by the brilliant Maya de Vitry) - because she suspected I’d love it. Wow was she right.

A Poem

Go to the Limits of Your Longing

by Rainer Maria Rilke; translated by Joanna Macy

God speaks to each of us as he makes us,
then walks with us silently out of the night

These are the words we dimly hear:

You, sent out beyond your recall,
go to the limits of your longing.
Embody me.

Flare up like a flame
and make big shadows I can move in.

Let everything happen to you: beauty and terror.
Just keep going. No feeling is final.
Don’t let yourself lose me.

Nearby is the country they call life.
You will know it by its seriousness.

Give me your hand.

Book of Hours, I 59

This poem is from Rilke’s Book of Hours: Love Poems to God. Translation by Joanna Macy and Anita Barrows.

Many years ago, I saw some lines from this poem on a plate, and I took a photo of the plate as a reminder: ‘One day, if I can justify spending money on wise ceramics, it will be mine.’ (A treasure to be defensibly hoarded!) Of course I promptly forgot where I’d seen it, so every now and then I just look at the photo, longingly. The point is, it’s a great poem, and if you own this plate? Well done.

Links!

After today, you’ll never again be able to say you didn’t know there was a Danish scientist in the 16th century called Ole Worm.

If you’re looking to give your CV a bit of a freshen-up (I know mine is basically a cobweb in PDF form), Harvard has free resume, CV and cover letter resources!

I find this TikTok of @corin_horn playing french horn through a vocoder absolutely mesmerising. All his videos are incredible, and make me feel like I don’t know how anything works. In a good way! People are so clever!

Types of Monk, In Order of How Often They Want You To Visit.

Do NOT come over!!! At MOST you can send something up in a bucket. like a single grape or a very important question you would like me to ask God.

Another day, another moustache. Ben made this series last year, and for reasons I don’t fully understand, YouTube has just recently become obsessed with recommending it to me. But you know what? Sometimes the algorithm just gets me. I love it!

The Top 10 British birdsongs. I found this article fascinating, surprisingly moving, and very accessible for bird know-nothings like me.

I especially enjoyed this measured dunk on the mistle thrush:

That a mistle thrush in song can easily be mistaken for a blackbird speaks for itself. Mistle thrush music has a stirring stridency. It is a little harsh but the song is delivered with such spirit it well deserves its place at number five.

Some major Autumnal nostalgia. (I’m sorry if this one means nothing to you. Can it be enjoyed as a standalone piece? Let me know.)

And that’s it! See you soon!

Love,

Katya

The Katch-Up's header illustration is by the brilliant Tamsin Baker. She also made me this gif which I will happily stare at for longer than I’d like to admit.

You can find previous letters - all 40 of them! - here.