It Suits Me.

Coffee, Ghosts and the English Countryside.

Aleks Sennwald is a brilliant storyboarder who worked on Summer Camp Island and Adventure Time.

I have an excellent Ewoks shirt in my closet because she wore it to work once and it looked so cool on her I had to have one too.

It didn’t suit me half as well as it suited her.

She just started a Substack and in her most recent post she recommended What I Talk About When I Talk About Running by Haruki Murakami. It was the Ewoks shirt all over again - I started reading it immediately. I was a huge Murakami fan in college -The Elephant Vanishes unlocked my love of short stories and the way he combined the melancholy and the matter of fact heavily informed my first animated short films, which I’ll talk about more soon.

What I Talk About When I Talk About Running is a very soothing read, but what has stuck with me most is the part where Haruki talks about why he runs. He says it isn’t because he’s more dedicated than anyone else, or more physically fit or better at getting up early in the morning:

I do it because it suits me.

This statement has been on my mind ever since. I’ve really only ever thought of something ‘suiting’ someone in terms of clothing or colours, and as i’ve gotten older, this knowledge has saved me a boat load of money and disappointment.

If say, one evening, I stumbled upon this United Colors of Benetton sweatshirt, and she’s perfect:

I shan’t be tempted! Because I know from years of experience, that I look like a thumb in orange. So I leave her where she is, looking gorgeous, worn by a ghost.

But perhaps if it came in navy…

Hatchie Matchie!

But then I found myself thinking about what suited me in other parts of my life:

Reading about ghosts suits me (it makes me happy)

Coffee doesn’t suit me (it makes me anxious)

Damp London air suits me (my skin looks quite a lot more dewy)

Los Angeles water doesn’t suit me (my hair looks rubbish)

I was thrilled! This way of thinking could embody both personal preferences and my constitution. I could have a third cup of coffee right now, I rawly desire the third cup of coffee, but I know, much like the orange Benetton sweatshirt, it definitely wouldn’t suit me.

So I sat down and I started writing a list of the things that suited me - but I quickly abandoned it in this notebook, to sit here forever entirely unexplained.

Because I had realized that the list needed to be in categories, and within the categories I would put my guaranteed hits - things that have followed me around my whole life, and that I keep coming back to - not just things I like, or want or desire (coffee, coffee, coffee, orange sweatshirt) but things that really suit me.

I once heard someone say that you should hide yourself in lots of different places so if one of those things falls away (your job, a relationship), you don’t lose yourself entirely. Like a not evil Horcux.

After having Max I certainly found myself standing in the kitchen a lot, trying to remember who I was, or what I liked. This exercise was very helpful in reminding me of some of those things.

The Things that Suit Me (an extract).

1. Exercise

• Walking in the British countryside

• Biking along the LA River

• Trying to learn how to do the splits.

2. Spirituality

• Ghosts

• Witches

• Theosophy

  • I do not practice but I love artists who explored it:

    • L. Frank Baum

    • Michael Ende

    • Hilma AF Klint

    • Lewis Carroll

    • P.L. Travers

3. Hobbies

Collaboration with Mel Keedle

• Ceramics

• Embroidery

• Going to see talks

4. Places

Downtown Public Library, Los Angeles

• Libraries

• Pubs

• Churches

• Forests

• Stationary Stores

• Farms

• London

• The British Countryside

5. Style

This is not me.

• Velvet

• Braided Hair

• Hairbands

• Blazers

• Tights

• Frilly collars

• Navy + Red

• To sum up: “British clown”

6. How I Best Consume Things

• Audiobook

• Podcast

• Substack

• Pinterest

• On a Train

• In bed

• While also doing pigeon pose so I might one day be able to do the splits

7. Sounds

• Music about breakups

• Wood Pigeon

8. Smells

• Mint

• Basil

• Dill

• Cinnamon

9. Artists

• William Steig

• James Marshall

• Hilma AF Klint

• David Hockney

• Sally Cruikshank

• Igor Kovalyov

• Priit Parn

• Hayao Miyazaki

10. Comedy

• Julio Torres

11. Books

• A Widow for One Year - Jon Irving

• The First Bad Man - Miranda July

• The Third Policeman - Flann O’Brien

• Little Women - Louisa May Alcott

• At Day’s Close - A. Roger Ekirch

• The Library Book - Susan Orlean

12. Nostalgia

• Gremlins

• E.T.

• Clowns

• The Muppet Christmas Carol

13. Subjects

• Medieval History

• Weather, such as puddles, clouds, rainbows, storms

• Ghosts again.

• The etymology of words

• Melancholy romance

14. Things I like to draw

• Animals

• Flowers

• Witches

• School supplies

15. Aspirations or things I will probably never do but like to think about doing

• Ballet

• Basketball

• Working on a farm

• Having a house in the country that looks like this

houseandgardenuk

A post shared by @houseandgardenuk

And it’s already coming in handy! I don’t love cooking - I find the whole ritual quite tedious, but I want to love it, so i’ve started pairing it with an audiobook and the task has become - dare I say it - almost enjoyable! HUGE! REVELATORY!

Perhaps you’re all reading this thinking

“JULIA - we all know this, everybody knows this, we’ve been doing this for years.”

But I didn’t know.

Thank you for indulging me! See you next week and please feel free to share your lists, what categories you would choose, anything at all!