punk babies
spring is coming with a strawberry in its mouth
One night when I was 20, I did a whip-it and my body remembered exactly how it felt the first time I heard Sleater-Kinney on the radio, “Little Babies” on 107.7 the end in the middle of a cool springtime Saturday afternoon when I was 13.
One morning last week I felt inclined to listen to The Gits. The cusp of spring is the time of year they are for. Twenty-three years and four weeks ago, Kaden and I moved in together, as housemates, and his massive CD collection became part of my life. “Frenching the Bully” by The Gits was one of the first CDs I took with me in the car for my commute to McDonald’s in the next town over—it was a tough time to enter the workforce in the Olympia area. Another was “The X Anthology,” which has the best version of “Nausea,” with this delightful bit where Exene tells a story about Debbie Harry being “real snotty.”
Later in the day, I listened to X. “Is there a word for that driving force that creates circle pits?” I asked Kaden, and Jordan, but neither of them had one. The Gits and X both use that propulsion as an underlying mechanism, but there is so much more—sound, and feeling, and poetics—layered over top and stuffed in the cracks. It’s so much weirder.
“Punk is for spring,” Kaden and I agreed, walking giddy to the bookstore. He was looking for the Auf der Mar memoir and I needed the new Andrew Martin novel. I came into 2026 with an aspirational conviction to not read anything that takes place in New York City this year, to stick it to the publishing industry. But Andrew Martin’s short story collection, “Cool for America,” is what convinced me I could write and publish fiction, period, and I love his work, so, whatever. My convictions are not that strong. We didn’t find either volume at either downtown Northampton bookseller.
“Punk is for spring, like, newborn babies squalling,” Kaden and I agreed. “They don’t know how to do anything.” (in a good way). Jordan and I were talking about “fuck yeah beginner’s mind or whatever they call it.” There was so much variation in early(ish) punk music. It didn’t mean just one thing. No one knew exactly what they were doing. I think this when I listen to oldies radio, too. “Waterloo Sunset”? It’s a weird song! I’m always trying to put a finger on the last moment of rock and roll (You Are Cat Power Free?), or, the last moment before every single song was the same pop song, structurally, the last moment before everyone sounded like they knew what they were doing. I wanted to write, maybe it was Grimes guilelessly channeling Mariah Carey that ruined everything. But then I thought, Visions was probably the last time a musician sounded like she stumbled upon something new because she didn’t know what she was doing (in a good way). After Grimes went to that, songwriting camp or whatever, and wrote “Go,”1 her music was no longer appealing.
There may not be a word for the propulsive grind that inspires circle pits, but if you want to read some words about the feeling of music ALLOW ME TO RECOMMEND THE PHENOMENAL SHORT STORY COLLECTION Hurricane Envy, by Sara Jaffe. Jaffe, who once played in the band Erase Errata—Other Animals was another CD I borrowed from Kaden’s shelf in 2003!—writes about (among other things) musicians who long to hear and to create a certain sound, to find the tools to transmit a feeling they may not have even felt yet.
Leni Zumas, one of the best writers of fictional punk musicians, in her introduction to “My Sleep” on Electric Lit, endorses Jaffe’s work better than I can fanboy about it:
“Like Perec and O’Hara, Sara Jaffe is an artist of the infra-ordinary. She assembles minor details into taut, poignant, uncanny tapestries. Her fictions happen in bedrooms, classrooms, bars, punk house parties, coffee shops; in these familiar spaces, she collects what is furtive and ever-so-slightly strange.”
The stories in Hurricane Envy are so deliciously quiet and subtle and so interior, it makes me realize my stories are bombastic and outside-action-based, even as I criticize myself that “nothing happens.” Hurricane Envy makes me want to learn to be subtle. I haven’t learned to write how people make room for each other’s orbits through gentle, brushing compromise. My characters are always only slam dancing and slam romancing. I haven’t learned how to raise tension from the interior, I haven’t learned how to put a thought process into words, I haven’t learned how to let my characters grow through their yearning, to find themselves blinking in silent wonder on the other side. Jaffe does all of this. Sometimes, reading, you slow way down to deeply savor what comes next. You know it’s going to be that good.
I read the story “Earth to You” about a year ago. I love it so much, it remains my favorite in Hurricane Envy. I have sent it to everyone I know who loves short stories, I talked about it in my interview on Feign (I talked about The Listeners by Leni Zumas too), I put it on Susie Bright’s reader survey. I emailed Sara Jaffe to tell her how much I loved it. Her 2014 novel Dryland is the sweetest pacific northwest queer teenage quiet rage family drama athletic transformation story ever told. One of the supporting characters is my biggest literary crush of maybe my whole adult life. I mean, there’s August in Women Talking, but he’s not gay and he doesn’t put on My Bloody Valentine.
Please, please find and read Hurricane Envy. It is even a fun size and shape, with excellent typesetting. And oh my god, there is also this, which I haven’t even delved into yet, Earth to You: Guitar Players Respond to a Short Story About a Guitar Player.
Every time I finish something big in my writing, which I did last week—not the big one, not my book draft, but a side project—I get a little too drunk. I have one rule about drinking, in my 40s, which is that I can have two 16oz beers or three 12oz beers (and this is usually only once a week). The problem is, drinking beers by its very nature makes you want to bend the rules.
Kaden was on Spring Break, so the fantasy was I would get off the bus after work and go out for a beer and he would meet me. It was supposed to be spontaneous, but I had to make a plan to bring an extra snack to work. I keep forgetting that I can make a plan, and it can still feel spontaneous to Kaden, if he doesn’t know about it. “Do you want me to surprise you with location?” I asked. “Yes!” he texted. “Love that idea!”
Packards, the townie-student-dive bar. We always drink the same beers there. I get the Fat Orange Cat Baby Kittens IPA. I’m not always seeking a juicy IPA, but that one is perfect. Kaden always gets Abandoned Building’s Dirty Girl IPA. He also gets it at Hadley Quarters, the queer arcade bar, and at the brewery, itself, and in cans from State Street Fruit Mart. I only wanted to drink at Packards if we could sit at the bar. Sitting at the bar is the new date night! some headline read, idk, last year. I had already figured that out. Why would you prefer to sit across the table from one another? It’s so formal. It’s sexier to angle towards one another, knock knees. Easier to drape your arm over your date’s shoulders or squeeze the back of their neck. You can still look them in the eye. It’s sexy to know that others might hear your conversation, especially as you (I) get louder. To eavesdrop and observe how the bartenders treat each other. I am both voyeur and exhibitionist.
So I ordered three 16oz beers, in the end, although we “shared” the third one (another drinking rule I have tried in the past is do not share beers with Kaden). At home, I ate half a 50/50 gummy right away, to ensure I would not keep drinking. I barely remember taking a shower. The last thing I googled: sebadoh song about j mascis. I started to get crabby when Kaden put on Steve Earle, and he placated me by asking if I wanted to watch “Licorice Pizza,” selling it as a coming of age film. I was halfway through the review of Paul Thomas Anderson’s œuvre in The New Yorker, and I thought Kaden had read it too, but I found out later he hadn’t, complete coincidence.
I wasn’t buying it in the first few scenes. I had to sink into the stylization before I could appreciate what it was doing. I did hit pause at one point to yell (sarcastic), “You know what I think would make this movie a whole lot better? If Paul Thomas Anderson had included A LITTLE MORE THIGH GAP. There just isn’t QUITE ENOUGH THIGH GAP.” Kaden said, “shhhhhhh.”
Please enjoy this interview I did with KP Kaszubowski for her Creative Access series, exploring the astrological charts of artists. Creative Access #6: Liina Koivula (Leo Rising, Taurus Sun and Moon) — Fiction writing, and slow is smooth and smooth is fast. You can watch or listen to the video or you can just read KP’s write-up.
We used to stream stuff off the computer onto cassette tapes and we did that with the super rough demo of “Go” that Grimes had posted, circa 2014? and that demo is pretty fun.
well this was a delight! on the first False Spring day a couple weeks ago I told Peter that spring is for pop punk very specifically. He skipped that sub genre so I played him some New Found Glory (I know you have cooler taste than that, but at least I am aware that NFG is not Good!). also *my* coming of age rock station was 107.9 the end!!!!