Feral Field Notes 003: Guilt, Friendship, & How Writing Keeps Saving Me
Day 3 of 100: Writing, questioning, beaching, and dropping more stuff onto the streets of Los Angeles to test my immune system.
Welcome to Feral Field Notes, a series where I’m documenting my 100 day writing pilgrimage across the US (start at the beginning here).
Save the Date: this month’s Writers Chat is this Sunday, June 29 at 11:00 am PST. Join me for an hour of our usual structure followed by an optional, 30-minute Q&A about my trip and learn just how behind I am in these field notes! This is a recurring chat for paid subscribers who can register for it here (it’s the honor system this month folks. I don’t have it in me to create a separate post right now).
Pilgrim Passport
Given how behind I am with these, I’m gonna reign back the details here from now on and just keep it simple.
Start
Los Angeles
End
Los Angeles, haha.
Feral Field Notes
Blergh. Bad dreams last night. The recurring kind that reminds me of all the deep-seated insecurities I still have around rejection.
If my mind had an HR department, I’d request a meeting (probably with a passive aggressive email with lots of modal verbs and a sickly sweet sign-off) so I could let them know: I get it. No more modules needed on this one, pleaseandthankyou.
I had a super long block of writing time this morning through the early afternoon, which felt amazing and luxurious (and included two surprise poems—why does this keep happening to me).
My friend and I had plans to hang out again after work, so I packed up in time to make the drive back to Santa Monica, gather picnic-y things, and set everything up in the back of my car.
The plan was to snack our hearts out while watching every kind of human you can imagine walk, roll, or stumble by on the boardwalk that’d be separating us from the ocean.
Before I got in my car though, I noticed the spot where someone had been sleeping last night on the street had been sprinkled with rose petals and possibly a fresh pillow and it cracked my heart in half.
On the drive to the ocean, I listened to the music from Nobody Wants This, a Netflix series that my friend and I love so much and want to smoosh into our lives, and this is partly how I’m doing that.
I probably listened to See Her Out by Francis and the Lights three or four times because it just makes me feel feel feel and I’m worried I’m going to ruin it soon because I can’t seem to not listen to it every day.
On this particular drive though, I actually paid attention to the lyrics for the first time since I honestly hadn’t understood half of the words til then. It hit a bit differently after filling in the blanks, this section in particular:
If you see her out there
Behind the wheel
Driving getaway
Oh god, I hope she escapes
Whole damn world is a cage
Eep. Am I trying to escape something, someone, myself, on this trip? I’ve got quite the track record of escapism, but… I don’t know. I don’t think so? Hm. You can’t totally trust people who put a question mark at the end of a statement, so maybe I am?
But writing is the through-line here, the path, the practice, the pilgrimage—and if you’ve ever journaled or done writing practice or typed red hot for ten pages without stopping before, you know that this kind of writing is the opposite of escapism. It’s a turning inward that forces you to face the shit you used to try and escape (because you know better now).
Again—and don’t be annoyed that I constantly quote Natalie because remember, this is a journey inspired by her after all, and she’s my primary guide—I think of what she wrote in Long Quiet Highway about the role of writing in her life:
“Writing became a tool I used to digest my life… (...) And we can’t avoid an inch of our own experience; if we do, it causes a blur, a bleep, a puffy unreality. Our job is to wake up to everything, because if we slow down enough, we see we are everything.”
I will say this though: while it’s great to slow down and see clearly and face the hard things so they don’t fester, I do also want and need a break? To have fun? To rest? What is with all these question marks?
Oh, I feel guilty for wanting and needing these things because the world is on fire and even before then because guilt was kind of the main motivating force for everything and also I’m a woman who shouldn’t ever have desires or act selfishly or be speaking at all. Probably just that. Ha ha.
Well, that’s all here, too, then. My mind kinda feels like a clown car bursting with feelings and thoughts and questions today, but thankfully, just like Fear on the first day, Guilt and its companions are just shitty backseat drivers, but I’m still at the wheel, for now.
Hopefully writing, and my other awareness practices, can help me keep my seat.
Photo Diary

New Category: The Latest Thing that Fell Out of My Car

With love from the road,
Katie
Continue to day 4 here.
Upcoming & Recurring
Next Writers Chat: Join me this Sunday, June 29 at 11:00 am PST for an hour of our usual structure followed by an optional, 30-minute Q&A about my trip and learn just how behind I am in these field notes!
This is a recurring chat for paid subscribers who can register for it here (it’s the honor system this month folks. I don’t have it in me to create a separate post right now).
Find everything else here.