✨ June✨

Dear Friends,

I am so sorry for the huge delay. Can you ever forgive me? I fell into a bit of a slump 😕 . I turned 26, which brought up a lot of emotions. I’m no longer a teenage girl!!! And life was (and still is) going absolutely non-stop, I caught a cold, and had a billion things to do at work. I felt stuck, unmotivated and uninspired. I share a lot of the good, bad, funny and ugly through this medium and, as I write a little more about in Mollie’s Mind, I had this feeling that I wished there was more good I could share or rather, better. It’s a reflection of my own dissatisfaction, but we are all our own worst critics, huh? I’ve been doing this newsletter now for almost a year and a half (can you believe it!?), and sometimes it’s a bit hard to maintain. It has, however, given me a new appreciation for writing, the significance of it, and the importance of staying connected to all of you cuties!! Yet, lately, I was wondering how long I can keep this going? I want to, of course, but I obviously am not writing short, undetailed pieces. Like maybe I should transition onto substack with the rest of the wannabe LitFic girls. What do we think chat?

xx

-Mollie

🎀 Mollie’s Monthly Memories🎀

Still On My Artist’s Way

To keep everyone updated on my creative renaissance. I am still doing The Artist Way. Technically, I am on Week 4 despite it being practically 3 months.  Okay, the point is that I am DOING it. I have been doing morning pages practically every day! and I even completed a full Moleskine notebook.

Play rehearsal was on hold because my scene partner, a 55-year-old man who works a the Zoo, was coughing up blood SO! Now my scene partner is a 45-year-old Canadian man who never stops talking.

I was reading Chapter 4 of The Artist’s Way, and the author was talking about how you know when Change is happening, because this whole experience is meant to be “transformational”. She said you may notice that you are getting rid of things that don’t serve you, like old clothes….. I was like oh damn. I purged my closet this month, started Vinted this past month, and have bags of clothes on my floor that are being donated to Oxfam. It was a weird moment, but one that felt significant enough to write about here. 

It's true that this month I felt like I needed to do a bit of a shed . I have sold FIVE things on Vinted and have made a total of £13 profit (rich), and have packed up 3 bags of clothes to donate (good person). So it felt very validating and somewhat spooky that this book was telling me it’s a sign that I am Changing, for the better, I believe. 

This Just In: I’m Good At My Job

As I said last month, working in fundraising is a never-ending cycle of putting in an abundant amount of effort for a likley chance of rejection. But….BUT!!! This month, I got an ACCEPTANCE. 

After the 15-page proposal I wrote a little after I started, and the various meetings with scary white old men, our funding was approved. £430,000. Ya’ll hear that? Almost HALF A MILLION DOLLARS. There was lots of screaming (of joy) when I announced it to the office.

It felt so special because I had never written a grant application before starting (yet im the Head of Fundraising.. iconic), and the first one I got is huge. So I am certifiably good at my job.

A Visit From Father Kerr

Drew Kerr voted early for the NYC Mayoral election (Fuck Cuomo) and made his way cross-ocean to London. Unfortunately, this was during the weekdays, so my 9-5 was occupied ☹️ .

However, during the evening we partied hard!!!. Ate at some amazing restaurants and we saw Evita!!!
I do think Rachel Zegler is a star. Her voice!!! Plus, everyone knows I have a soft spot for the history of the Argentinian political landscape!! For ANYONE who doesn’t like the fact that in the play she goes outside the theatre to sing for a crowd LIVE, then you are a fascist, sorry. 

It is always lovely having a piece of home in London! Thanks for visiting! Love you dad xx

Turning 26 in Prague

Despite the evident denial I am currently in, I did, in fact, turn 26.  “But Mollie, you dont look a day over 9”  I know, I know. I also know that ageing is a privilege, and I am lucky to be growing old etc.

I did, however, get to turn 26 in the Czech Republic with some of my best friends. So win some, lose some. 

It’s the first time I went away on a birthday trip, so it felt very much not like my birthday. Nonetheless, we had A TIME!

After a delayed flight and a nasty burger from the Stansted Airport Wetherspoons, and a child falling asleep on me on the plane, we made it to Prague!!!!!! ahhhhhhhh

Day 1: 

I had meticulously planned out this weekend practically by the hour because I am not easygoing or laid back, despite what I tell men on Hinge.  We obviously had to begin with the only man I want talking in my ear, Rick Steves. For those who don’t know Ricky baby, he does walking tour podcasts for cities all over the world, one of which, the Prague one, we did. When we stopped for brunch, Maura and Susana asked for some tap water, the waitress said “not possible,” so we were off to an incredible start.

Walking through Prague and across the Charles Bridge, despite being full of tourists, was beautiful. We rubbed some statues for good luck and then said a prayer in front of Saint Anthony of Padua because apparently he blesses people with boyfriends. We finished our walking tour, ate some ice cream and found a beer garden. Nothing like sitting by a body of water, drinking Aperol spritz while a white man with dreadlocks sings Wonderwall for 45 men on bachelor parties…and us. 

Let me say something real quick. These fucking bachelor parties. If my fiancee goes on his bachelor party and wears clothes that say things like “game over” or “the last hoorah” OR they say something along the lines of “this is my last week as a single man” I would say honey this is your first week as a single man because I would not be SEEN with a man like that. Are y’all out of your fucking minds?!!!??!! 

We got a matcha and walked around the Jewish Quarter. As I was slurping up the last of the matcha. A. DEAD. MOTH. FELL. IN.  Where did it fall from??? I do not know. Did it before or after I had taken a sip???? I do not want to know.

After dinner, we found an absinthe bar oooooo. I’ve never had absinthe before. Truthfully, I used to get confused between absinthe and arsenic. I knew they were both not good for you?

I will add here that at this point, my voice was starting to disappear. I hadn’t really done any screaming, I think God just knew I would be too powerful turning 26 and being able to speak. 

While looking at the menu, a man (whom we concluded was from Miami, so everyone can picture him) turned around and said,

 “It’s really strong, so if you have acid reflux, be careful”. 

First of all, honey, keep your reflux to yourself?…. Disgusting.  Then he said, “Here, try mine” 

“Umm….No, thank you”, I replied. Hello!! Germs!! Remember the PANDEMIC?

 “Jeez”, he said, incredibly offended “, it’s not like I roofied myself”  Brooooooo. NO ONE said anything about ROOFIES, the only one talking about roofies is YOU brother. 

We went upstairs. The waiter, a bald man wearing a wooden bowtie, came to our table to talk us through the various ways to drink absinthe and make intense eye contact with me. I ordered just plain absinthe, which ended up feeling like drinking diesel fuel.  So I ordered an absinthe cocktail instead. 💅 Remember the bachelor parties (or stag dos as we say in the UK) I mentioned earlier? Well, there was one next to us. And boy oh boy did they absolutely suck!

At first, they were just loud, but then they decided to take their water pitchers and use said pitchers as a make-shift penises to emulate urination!!!!! Ya hear me!! Emulate!! Urination!!!!! So water was now being spilt all over the floor, and then they started throwing water around. Like THROWING water around. Splashed everyone in the vicinity and those on the floor below, including Mr. Roofie (he deserved it, though). As they were being kicked out, they tried to come to our table to apoologize, to which we responded with silence and faces of repulsion. As an apology (… and because I’m pretty duh), our waiter brought us some free shots (!!!) Nom nom nom.

When it was time to take our departure. Our waiter looked at me and said, “I would like to ask you on a date but I know you are just visiting and don’t have time”. I said “Okay!! 😀 Bye bye!” The men of Prague sense my Eastern European ancestry and see my Polish childbearing body and just fall in love. Can you blame them? 

Day 2: 

 At 12am on June 22nd, I rang in 26 the only way I know how… by playing Birthday by Selena Gomez and spilling a cup of tea on the bed while taking selfies.

After waking up officially, I did my morning pages because it felt important to them on my birthday. At this point, my voice sounded more like a prepubescent squeak but nevertheless, she persisted ✊ I wore butter yellow, we walked and walked and walked, saw the Franz Kafka head, John Lennon Wall, got an incredible matcha, I ate eggs out of a glass, and of course had more Aperol spritzes. Before catching the tram to dinner, I got some cute af photobooth pics.

We had to climb nearly 300 STAIRS to get to dinner because it was overlooking Prague Castle. They made my ass WORK for it. Maura was obviously fine while Yaz, Susana and I were having asthmatic attacks, and Yaz is the only one with asthma, so what does that say?

Dinner was gorgeous, fantastic, and synonyms for that.  Our waiter at dinner gave us not one, not two, but THREE free rounds of shots.

Maura asked if she could get the Salmon from the tasting menu because she’s a vegetarian and didn’t want only other veggie option, egg in dill sauce for dinner (very fair), He said that fine and then, so we can “at least try it”, proceeded to bring a bowl of the dill sauce out for us all to have. If we learned anything from this trip is that Czech men are in love with me and I need to move. Happy birthday was sung, and a chocolate cake was devoured, and I genuinely felt, and feel, so grateful.

We took the long walk home across the Charles Bridge, stopped for photoshoots, and ended the night by watching the Astronomical Clock do its final strike of the evening. 

Day 3: 

We ate an American brunch and bid au revoir to Maura, who had an earlier flight (A flight that was later cancelled, RIP). 

We visited a synagogue which was gorgeous. 

While there, I had the thought, if there was anywhere in the world that I were to feel connected to my Jewish ancestors, it would probably be here, in Eastern Europe, where my ancestors, including my namesake, are truly from. But I’m not planning on colonising Poland anytime soon!!!! Don’t worry about that ya’ll xx.

After the synagogue and cooling off in a mall (there are so many malls in Prague), we made our way to an early dinner. Some yummy yummy raw meat. 

And that was it. We got on our RyanAir flight, Susana and I ate fuet like a hot dog, and we made our way back to London

More Birthday Celebrations

For someone whose birthday brings them a lot of anxiety and despair, I sure do demand that everyone acknowledge and celebrate it. 

My co-workers surprised me with a big chocolate cake, which was frozen solid, so we couldn’t actually cut and eat it until the following day.

Then I forced some more friends to celebrate me again in the blistering London heat… never thought I’d type those words. But truthfully, it was really a celebration for Rory baking me a cake. Which was simply perfect for me as it was vanilla cake with vanilla icing. They say British people hate flavor, but let me tell you, they hate the flavor plain. What happened to plain? Why are all chips flavored like “balsamic vinaigrette and black garlic” or  “angus steak and green onion” girl I JUST WANT SALTED. 

Anyway, I deeply appreciate everyone who makes me feel so loved.

I Went Bowling with Strangers

When three strange men ask you to go bowling, do you say yes?

Well, Eden and I did. These “posh boys” were 6.5/10s at best but fine with me as long as they were buying all my drinks 💅 .  Turns out when I’m put under pressure (men staring at me), I am an incredible bowler. I couldn’t tell if they were hitting on us or dating each other, but turns out the answer was neither because they all had girlfriends. Absolutely insane. Girl, why did you invite me to bowling? To be my friend? bffr. Petition to give men a curfew?? We did genuinely have a blast. Talking to strangers can lead to fun adventures (sometimes). One of the boys did say I had “good chat”, which seems like the British seal of approval if I’ve ever heard it.

🎀 Mollie’s Mind 🎀

When Good Outweighs Good, But it's Still Not Good Enough

As I wrote in the beginning, I was in a bit of a funk at the beginning of this month. I turned 26, and I was like, okay, what have I done?

For the past five years, I have made a list like the “22 things I want to do at 22”, “23 things I want to do at 23”,  and so on and so on. What started as a cute quasi-bucket-list idea quickly turned into another reason I get sad on my birthday. Why didn’t you just stop making them Mollie? Idk maybe because I’m Jewish, so we love tradition, and I also love to set myself up for disaster.  

My birthday always prompts reflection in the same way New Year's would, or frankly, any anniversary. It’s a time marker. “Where was I this time last year?” quickly followed by “Am I better than I was this time last year?”. 

So when looking back at the 25 things I wanted to do at 25, I was not …too happy. Probably because most of my “goals” are impossible and ambiguous. So I thought to make myself feel better, I should list 25 things that I definitely did accomplish… and I only made it to 20…. But when I critically think about it, I’m clearly more concerned with quantity than quality. I only “did 20 things”, but one of those was literally getting a job. Shouldn't that count for at least 3 spaces?  I went to six new countries, got a master's degree, but for some reason, because it doesn't reach an arbitrary quota I’m upset? 

I self-sabotage by setting extravagant goals and unattainable standards, not just yearly but daily, and beat myself up for not achieving them; it’s masochistic.  The number doesn't really matter, obviously, the point I’m getting at is that nothing is ever really good enough for me. I am rarely happy with where I have been or where I am, and always focused on where I want to be. And when I get there, I’m unsatisfied. Little wins go unnoticed, and I only mark milestones like getting a job or graduating, and even with those successes, I still feel some void, unfilled. Someone could sit in front of me and list every good thing I’ve ever done, and I still feel like I should’ve done more.

The word “but”, that damn adversative conjunction, haunts me. With every success, there is always a caveat. I hosted a great party, but some people didn’t show up. I am in a play, but it wasn’t the part I wanted. I got a huge win at work, but I also got a lot of rejections. I had a great Friday night, but my friend posted on Instagram that she’s at a better super duper cool and fun party. I turn every success into a failure. Maybe it’s greed, or perfectionism, or envy or something else.

I predict this stems from a few things, honestly. I was a late bloomer in school (illiterate),  so I always needed extra help. I continually compared myself to the people around me (and still do), I didn’t get the lead role in any high school show, and I have been in relationships that made me feel inadequate. In college, with a double major in theatre and political science, I would say (as a joke that really wasn’t a joke) “I’m not talented enough for theatre and not smart enough for politics” I was, and still am so harsh on myself and for what? A desperate desire for something to be proud of…. or at least someone to be proud of me. All of this has tornadoed inside me and has turned me into someone who makes lists of things I need to do to feel like I am worthy of something.

And here’s a truth bomb for everyone. I feel like I can be honest with ya’ll, my loyal readers made up of relatives, close friends, ex-co-workers and people I haven’t seen in five years. As a woman, success is qualified by whether you are in a relationship or not. There! I said it. Can’t take it back. But it’s true, isn’t it? Despite my career, my intelligence, body tea, and my joie de vivre, I’m single, which, hand to heart, I'm content with right now, but the feeling of “falling behind” or “unfulfillment” feels inseparable from it.

So here I am, now 26 years of age, and I wish I could write here and say I didn't make that list this year, “26 things to do at 26”. Maybe I can say that next year. The girl who was in the “slow” class, the girl who once played “enough for you” by Olivia Rodrigo over and over in the car while arguing with my ex, the girl who perpetually got the understudy roles, she still lives in me. In her never-ending quest for validation and fulfilment, she makes lists, hoping that next year she'll finally feel satisfied.

I do hope one day I grow out of it and being, doing and feeling “enough” becomes a given rather than something always out of reach.

🍵 Mollie’s Matcha 🍵

🎀 Mollie’s Music 🎀

No one loves this song the way I love this song

Thanks for reading.

I miss you all so much,

XXXX

-M