Sonya Cheney

Writer. Witch. Creatrix.

who do i write for?

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I’ll write for myself, whether anyone else reads it or not.

But then—if I write something, then choose to submit it, or write something and choose to publish it, does that negate my declaration to write only for myself? Does writing for myself mean hiding it away in my hard drive forever?

I mean, probably not. But it still feels a little disingenuous to claim I’m writing for myself only to put it out into the world after all.

This is a debate with myself that’s been plaguing me for the past week or so as I was writing in my journal thinking, “Fuck it, I’m just going to write for the straight love of it like I did when I was a kid.” No holds barred, no plans for any piece, no strict schedules or ultimate goals besides the writing itself. If I have an idea, I’ll put on paper (or screen) once I feel like it. A few days after this personal declaration, though, I discovered a literary magazine that piqued my interest and has me thinking about writing a piece to submit.

What the fuck, right?

I’m sure it’s not as big of a deal as I’m considering it to be. If I didn’t write this post, no one would know the difference anyway—but I wanted to write this. I wanted to work through my own head, invite opinions, and talk it out.

I’m always going on (and on and on) about the way I used to write on MySpace and LiveJournal, and I don’t think I’ll stop anytime soon. I loved the freedom and the openness with which I used to write those posts—on LiveJournal, especially, I actually assumed no one was reading, which made it so much easier to be vulnerable. I dipped my toe into that vulnerability while writing zines but, to be honest, I can’t seem to bring myself to write zines anymore. I’m not sure why; I love the physicality and the aesthetic of them. I adore a good black and white, text-heavy perzine. I loved the process of cutting and pasting. But my enthusiasm for that type of DIY has waned so much since about the time I got pregnant. I might still make an issue of Whatsername sometime this year, but having a blog is just easier, and with writing itself being my real goal, then I’m not going to be too hard on myself about my chosen medium.

I do miss it, though. It’s a little heartbreaking not to feel a part of that world anymore, but my priorities have changed, so my style and approach have changed with them—and that’s okay.

Even if I still have blog posts and submissions and self-publishing in the back of my mind, I think, if they’re not my ultimate goal, then it still counts as writing for myself, writing for the sake of writing. Writing for the sake of the craft. I type these thoughts because it’s the best way to get them out. I’m publishing them because it’s a good way to be able to look back at them, and maybe someone else has a suggestion or has been through the same struggle. Maybe someone is currently going through it. Maybe it’ll help me make a connection with someone.

If not, though, I won’t be disappointed.

june 2020 | life lately.

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Our house was blessed with a loveliness of ladybugs (really, look it up!), and I take that to be a good sign for our future in this home.

I would surprise no one by saying there’s been an absurd amount of plain shit going on. Global pandemic, civil rights movements, murder hornets, alien invasion… Wait, that one hasn’t happened yet.

Anyway, you understand what I’m saying.

And in the midst of it all, survival–literal and spiritual–have been at the top of the list. In between sending donations, educating myself, and trying to support as much as I can in as many ways as I can, my life has still maintained its general status quo inside our rural New England bubble. It’s a privilege I’m trying not to take for granted.

Dan mentioned his surprise at the fact that I’ve maintained a consistent knitting routine even in the summer heat–I promise, it’s only because I’ve managed to have a fan blowing directly on myself any day that reaches eighty degrees fahrenheit or above. Otherwise, I would be nothing but a puddle of my own sweat, tears, and tangled yarns. I’ve been trying to branch out more in my recent projects. I’ve tended to knit a lot of socks in the last year or so, and I still knit a lot of them, but I decided this year to try mixing things up a bit. It began with the Find Your Fade shawl by Andrea Mowry, which, while a long process, was an absolutely lovely experience to knit. I feel like I learned some new things and it was possibly one of the most creative projects, I’ve worked on thus far. I followed it up with a set of Piitu mitts by Heidi Alander and the Ripple bralette by Jessie Maed Designs. Next in my queue? Colorwork by way of the Underwing mitts by Erica Heusser. (Note: These all link to the new Ravelry site, so please be aware if you been having accessibility issues.)

I’ve also managed to begin a new, as yet untitled, novel. Horror, young adult contemporary, set at a prep school. (Well, is the 1990s considered contemporary anymore?) I haven’t worked much the past week or two, but I have the most thorough outline I’ve ever produced, and when I do work, I tend to knock out a chapter in only an hour or two. I can say with confidence that I’ve been converted from a pantser to a planner. It’s been fantastic for my morale, and even if I don’t work on it in an obvious sense–i.e., sitting down with my computer and tip-tapping away at the keyboard–I’m spending a good amount of my time thinking about it and working through whatever roadblocks might crop up from time to time.

Naturally, I jumped on the sourdough bandwagon. My original plan was to work my way through Bread Baking for Beginners in a linear fashion, but when just about everyone on Instagram began to do it, I threw my hands up and said, “Fuck it! I’ll give it a go!” I don’t consider any of my first loaves perfect, but I love the feeling of maintaining the starter. I’ve named her Lilith (sorry, nothing cleverly quarantine-themed like so many others have done), and I keep her in the fridge for a weekly feed rather than daily in order to save on flour.

I’ve intentionally forgone a photo of the inner crumb because I’m still not happy with the size or distribution of the air pockets. Right now they tend to be collected towards the top of the loaf, which is fine, I suppose. The flavor is still wonderful and it makes a damn fine grilled cheese. But it’s something I plan to keep working on over time because, well, why not? I love baking bread. Dan especially loves sourdough. It’s a win-win for our house.

I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t trying to maintain some semblance of normalcy through all of…this. *gestures wildly* But I also know that “normal” isn’t all it’s cracked up to be, not if it looks like white supremacy and needless death and social inequity. But my hobbies, trite and inconsequential as they may be, keep me grounded. They keep me going. They keep me centered enough to come back to the fight for bigger and better things for us all.

alternate realities.

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I can’t sleep. I wouldn’t even say it’s that late (10:45pm as I type), but it’s the latest I’ve been awake in weeks. Since moving into our temporary housing, I’ve managed to fall asleep by ten every night and be up by six-thirty every morning. It’s been a wonderful routine, but something’s just off tonight, and I can’t quite seem to make it work. Maybe it’s something in the air. Maybe it’s the Beltane sabbat energy. Maybe it’s just poor luck. I don’t know.

As I was lying in bed, occasionally turning from my left to my right side and back, I went back to a thought I shared with my mom and a friend earlier this week, and it got me to doing a little not-quite-daydreaming.

Sometimes I think that if my current self didn’t have Dan–and now Finn–then I would live in a van, traveling the country with a dog (probably a hound), freelance writing, practicing photography, and being a nomadic witch. Or else I would live in a hut in the forest with a dog, and this time also a cat, and be a spooky witch of the woods. Mostly, though, it’s that van idea that’s stuck with me these past few days; when I was a teenager I loved the style of the old Volkswagen Buses, and over the past few years I’ve grown fascinated by the #vanlife. I’ve still only investigated it in passing–the occasional blog post read or scroll through the Instagram tag, but it’s intriguing, exciting to think about the possibility of that kind of freedom.

Instagram is, of course, the highlight reel of the lifestyle. There are certainly those who share the gritty behind-the-scenes realities of living a traveling life, the vehicle breakdowns and repair costs, the less frequent bathing opportunities, the dirt and cold and loneliness that can come with it all. But it’s still got an appeal to it. There’s an adventurous nature to it all and, like I said, a freedom that it conveys to see someone on the road or in a desert or a vast field with nothing but the things they can carry with them. Imagine that level of simplicity. It’s captivating.

In my dreams, these scenes are full of shades of orange and green and yellow and brown. There are scraped knees and dirty fingernails beside a campfire, a dog curled up at my feet. A camera or two sit beside me and a journal is open across my lap, page after page scribbled with stories and observations. This version of myself has a rawness to her that I can see deep in myself now but don’t know how to get out. I wish I knew how.

I can’t wait to move into our new home. The other half of my time spent daydreaming revolves around renovations—paint colors, furniture styles, and shelves upon shelves of books. But sometimes it’s fun—if a little sad—to think about what might have been if I were a different person. I’m much too dependent on other people to keep me company, to keep me functioning to a certain degree, to ever actually believe I could do something like live a van lifestyle. Still, it gives me a thrill to let my imagination run wild.

before it was cool.

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In November, I started watching Jenna Fischer’s bread baking videos on Instagram, which lead me to ordering Bonnie Ohara’s Bread Baking for Beginners—previously mentioned in my eight-hour no-knead bread post—and diving headfirst into the world of bread baking.

I’d been making bread for a while before then: a bulgur wheat recipe that I got in college and still love; the occasional homemade pizza; one cinnamon-raisin loaf so successful that our dog ate all but one slice in a single go. I love bread (who doesn’t?), and in my years-long effort to become a self-reliant homesteader, bread became one of the skills being added to my repertoire. It wasn’t until November, though, when that perfect book came into my life that my love of the loaf really started to blossom.

Then the pandemic hit, and now everyone and their brother seems to be making bread on Instagram, and I’m not going to lie—I feel a little less cool now.

I can’t begrudge anyone making the best of a bad situation and learning to fend for themselves even in this small way. Making bread is a cool skill and, like I said, who doesn’t love bread? Any time someone mentions to me, even in passing, that they want to learn to bake bread, it’s all I can do to stop myself from shoving a copy of Bread Baking for Beginners into their hands. I would gladly buy a copy for every person I know if I could afford it. But that doesn’t mean there isn’t that small part of me, some holdover from being a teenager no doubt, that gets a little disgruntled by the nineteenth photo of bread I scroll past on Instagram in one sitting. (Granted, one sitting could be quite a long time.)

It’s always been a part of my personality, this wanting to be seen as unique in some way or another, but the reality is that it’s near impossible to truly be unique. I might be the only Me in the world, but I’m not the only person who loves to bake, who loves to knit, who loves cats, has a son, is a witch, wears size six and a half shoes, or some combination of any of those traits. And the funny thing is that there are plenty of people who were, say, baking bread before I was and who I thought were cool for doing so—who’s to say I wasn’t that same person to someone else? Who’s to say I’m not still?

Being inside your own head and forgetting to explore other people’s perspectives can be detrimental in so many ways, big and small. We know that seeing the world at large from another person’s point of view can be helpful; that’s something we’re taught in elementary school. But we don’t always remember to think about how our own world, on a personal level, looks to someone else, unless it’s in a self-conscious way.

What if they don’t like what I’m doing?
What do they think of my outfit?
What if I’m too much or not enough?

I think it could be important to start thinking about the positive ways people can see us, the positive effects we can have on others even if we don’t know it’s happening.

Maybe someone will make their own version of this.
I wonder if anyone will have questions.
I’ll add some recommendations in case anyone wants to learn more about this.

The people I admire the most—specifically on Instagram, since that’s where I spend most of my time—are ones I consider cool because I learn from them. They inspire me to try new skills and hobbies, and they inspire me to get better, to do better, to stop worrying so much. If I was baking bread “before it was cool,” then maybe someone saw it, and it inspired them to bake their own. Or maybe it didn’t. But it shouldn’t be a competition either way. Too many things are competitive when they don’t need to be, and I shouldn’t turn bread into another one of those things for no reason other than my own ego. Like the people that I, even in the last year of my twenties, look up to, I need to just do my thing and fuck everything else.

I need to just let them bake bread.