so, how do you figure out what to write about?

a pearl anklet, cardamon bun and red socks

every week like clockwork, my friends are subjected to my long sighs as i dramatically exclaim, “i have no idea what i am going to write about for angel cake!” i say this as though my thoughts have run dry as a bone and i will be held at gunpoint to an inevitable flop where all of my readers are disgusted by the unoriginality of my simple thoughts. i make peace with the fact that i had a good run, i loved writing for as long as i did and angel cake will slowly sink into the abyss of abandoned newsletters.

then, at some point in the week i naturally forget that i’m supposed to write at all. i go for long walks in the morning where my phone is in my pocket and i get to wave to my intergenerational morning friends who also walk the highline at 8 A.M. i go to dinners with best friends and loose acquaintances and usually say absurd things over plates of salty fries and greasy pad thai and decadent cakes while dramatically talking with my hands between bites. i watch movies by myself in my apartment with my candles glowing and my red notebook next to me so i have an outlet to write down my thoughts without being distracted by another screen. i call my mom to catch up and feel her warmth transfer from the phone to my cheek. i go to parties where i drink only one drink too many while gay men tell me they like my haircut and sweet girls tell me they like my outfit and straight boys purposefully ignore me because don’t worry they’ll just message me later. i strike up conversations with the strangers that weave in and out of my day through transactional interactions, the real transaction being a blissful fleeting moment of anonymous connection. i read in my bed at night usually falling asleep with my book still being in my hand which makes me feel like a child who deviously stayed up past their bedtime. i have moments where i act unbelievably harsh to myself, lashing at the ways i self-sabotage dissecting every action i regret, and i also have moments where i think about how kind my thirteen year old self would be to me now. i pause to tell strangers on the street that their babies and dogs are beautiful because i secretly envy the physical manifestation of their stability. i break things and spill on myself and clumsily push away any compliment that comes my way because i can’t stand the idea being worthy enough to let the words sink into my skin, continuously rejecting good things that come to me. i buy print magazines when i’m hungover as a way to tether my head from anxious rumination into something more tangible and smarter than myself. i ponder whether i should get another tattoo and try to pinpoint the cause of my restlessness. i write to-do lists and only feel a nanosecond of relief when i cross something off before fixating on the next bullet. i eat pastries with my friends at places that serve things like a “spiced banana sesame caramel danish” while we crumbly dissect every aspect of our lives, pleading for each other to see ourselves as we see each other.

somehow throughout the haze of this minutia i gleefully get the idea of what i want to write about for the week, i rush to open my laptop and forget that anything else exists. i write without taking into consideration anyone reading this because somehow i am really good at disassociating (a blessing and a curse). i try not to think about typos or grammar (hence the lowercase… sore spot among the discourse i hear…) sometimes people ask what i write about and eventually will say, “so, how do you figure out what you are going to write about?” the general thesis of my 2025 has been that if you stop ruminating on something, it naturally comes to you. despite appearing as an extremely “online person” i know that the only things that matter are what is in front of me staring back with an open gape. i value the creases in someone’s forehead and the weight of their spoken word as opposed to an instagram story like or a blue bubble on my screen. i rarely have a interesting thought that isn’t derived from the tangibility of my uniqueness which could never be found in the apple app store. my interest in a person will always lie in the humor and honesty of their actions as opposed to our mutual follower list. i cherish and retch at my gullible nature knowing i will always trust the formations of someone’s mouth over a digital interaction.

i’m applying this theory of mental detachment to writing, but i think it is applicable to pretty much anything we enjoy doing. this is easier said than done as the boundaries between our personal, work and romantic lives are becoming borderless blob tethered by a device. in the span of five minutes on the subway you can send a professional work email, text your parents back, make a plan to go on a date and schedule a dentist appointment. what you probably missed was the high school teacher grading her papers between stops, the two teenagers gossiping using words you’ve never heard of with an excitement that remains universal, and a couple unconsciously holding pinkies in an effort to savor the smallest point of contact with each other. we’re constantly able to feed into the distractions that keep us from actually settling into our thoughts. this in turn causes a merry-go-round of hopeless anxiety to “create” which is impossible when we’re not actually standing where our feet are. the thing is, it feels soooooooo good to distract. to be anywhere other than where you are, despite how “good” your life is there is always a rush of serotonin glowing in your pocket. however, the only time i actually feel like myself is when i stop thinking about what i am going to write about, put my phone away, and just stare at what is right in front of me.

EPILOGUE- 10 things i have been thinking about this week

i realized while editing this draft that this is the 100th edition of angel cake (!!!) as a deeply nostalgic person, i naturally went back to the first thing i ever published which was almost two years ago. the format i used to write in was a simple list of 10 things i was thinking about that week in an effort to not bombard my friends with all of the strange things i like to momentarily obsess over. the three things i included in the headline were, “a pearl anklet, a cardamom bun, and red socks” upon reading this title i broke out into a big smile because i still wear my red socks almost everyday, eat a cardamon bun every week, and will dutifully wear my pearl anklet in the summer. what and how i write has evolved, but i knew myself then and i know myself now. i still haven’t moments where i act like an alien version of the pearl anklet, cardamon bun red sock girl; but, my main goal for the year is for that to happen less and less.

as a nostalgic nod to my march 2023 self, here are 10 things i have been thinking about this week :)

1. mickey 17- i went to see mickey 17 because i would blindly see anything attached to bong hoon jo and robert pattinson. i liked it a lot, didn’t love it. 3.5/5 for me personally. i won’t go too into details because i don’t want to spoil anything but robert pattinson IS amazing and it IS a good time. what struck me more than the movie itself was that when i walked into the theatre it was FULL of boys. this is definitely a Boy Movie because it hits upon all the checkpoints: it’s sci-fi, things blow-up, it’s political in an extremely obvious and digestible way and there’s a threesome (the threesome was actually more for the girls now that i am thinking about it). anyway, go to the movies!

2. “what’s the weirdest thing you ate all week?” last night my friends and i were at a party and a stranger came up to us and asked, “what’s the weirdest thing you ate all week?” i took him by the shoulders and said, “i love this question” i appreciate and notice when someone asks a good question, i find it to be arguably one of the most endearing aspects of a person (ironic because i actually think i am bad at asking interesting questions..). my answer was that i had a ma’amoul inspired pop-tart from librae bakery earlier that day.. it had orange blossom icing and a date & fennel filling. excellent. i usually don’t like the sophistication of simple childhood food like pop-tarts and pizza bagels etc. because i am a stubborn purist, but the barista really sold me on it.

3. yearning- i am not a yearner by nature. it makes me uncomfortable, i like to go after what i want and try to make things happen for myself (the operative word being try here) that being said, i love art centered around yearning. the best music, movies, tv, books, paintings, poems etc. are all tinged upon unrequited desire of all kinds; it is the perfect vehicle for creativity because it looks like silk and feels like a callus. i was on the phone with a friend yesterday and he was describing a crush he had and then referenced a different Big Crush from his past which i thought he had moved on from. he paused and i said, “you know, you’re a big yearner” i’m getting used to the idea that we’re all perpetually in a cycle of yearning for people, places, jobs that do not want us back. the thing you’re yearning for is probably yearning for something else which does not want them either. it’s gorgeous and disgusting and so viscerally human. i joked to my friends that i was “giving up yearning for lent” but i think it’s more interesting to spread myself out with my big blue eyes open wide. as i am typing this as lacy by olivia rodrigo is playing in the coffee shop. WE ARE ALL YEARNING!

4. self tanning- i have a long, harrowing journey with self-tanning/spray tans. in college i fell prey to the tan, i would get a LEAST one spray tan a week, my sheets were perpetually orange, my pheromones were that of a level 3 bronze mist. it was bad. i stopped after college because i decided i need to grow up and buy expensive sheets. i have however- relapsed. after i self-tan the air feels different, colors are more vibrant, the birds chirp louder. all feels right. i encourage us all to pray at the alter of the mitt. (this is my formal pledge i am not going to overdo it and i am committed to NOT staining my sheets.)

5. my new simone rocha t shirt- i’ve been thinking about this t-shirt for almost a year as it is perpetually on sale on ssense. i bought it because i am incapable of not buying myself $100 treats for no reason and because in the spring/summer my “uniform” is comprised mainly of t-shirts and mini-skirts. if you are worried that i am leaning too far into the angel/cherub motifs, you are not alone!

6. Catherine Shannon
   ’s commitment to using a flip phone- not to be too dramatic (lol) but do you remember how life used to feel? changed my perspective on how i live my life. a lot of what i touched on above tethers around how hard it is for us to be where our feet are which is exasperated by the phone. lately i just want to scream that the only things that matter are what is right in front of us and we should prioritize our lives accordingly. go for a walk! bake some bread! (well, i won’t be doing that) clean your living room! ask your friend how their parents are! i cannot express how lame to care about what other people are doing on the internet and let that affect your perception of yourself.

7. the bee sting by paul murray- i am going to do something insane and recommend something i haven’t finished yet, but i bought the bee sting in an effort to read a project book (this is what i call any book over 500 pages) that is extremely readable, well-written, and won’t make me depressed. so far it is doing the job. will issue a amendment if my opinion changes by the end….

8. vintage prize ribbons- i discussed this a bit in best in show, but i have been really obsessed with looking for prize ribbons on eBay/etsy. i still think the ribbon is the next evolution of the bow (and for the record, you will have to pry the bow out of my hands), but the ribbons feel so referential without being too costume-y and quintessential americana without being too overly patriotic (especially these days…). need to give a shout out to my friend

   Kate Snyder
   for being the prize ribbon princess.

9. the relationships music video- as both an outspoken lover of HAIM and of drew starkey, this was big for me. the colors are so perfectly balanced and interesting it feels like a massage for my brain. i love danielle’s varsity tank top and underwear, i love her sequin jersey, i love her t-strap heels… !!! a lot of what they are wearing is vintage prada accroding to

   Viv Chen
   , which makes sense why i am being a freak over it. so good.

10. gohar world oven mitts- those who know me know that i am deeply undomestic and really bad at baking and cooking. i shouldn’t say “bad”, i just get frazzled and overwhelmed due to my clumsiness and i am someone who does NOT like to be frazzled or overwhelmed. i still don’t have proper oven mitts/pot holders i just use a tea towel which is annoying and unchic. if i AM bringing anything into the kitchen i want it to be as fabulous as possible which is why i am a gohar world devotee, i really want these oven mitts and will probably buy them as another $100 treat for no reason <3

notice how i did NOT put the new season of white lotus on here because i quite frankly haven’t been thinking about it because it is not that good!!! (except for parker posey).

i feel a lot of pride in writing 100 angel cakes because the older i get, the more i value the honesty and intention in my actions. if i tell someone, “omg we haveeeeeee to get dinner soon” i’ll be texting them to schedule dinner. if a friend and i make a loose plan to do something insignificant on a sunday, i have penciled that into my calendar. if i give someone a compliment, i mean it. i wasn’t always like this, a lot of insecurity and immaturity manifests into being noncommittal; but, i have grown into my ability to mean what i say and follow through of my actions no matter how uncomfortable, annoying or laborious it can be. i casually said to a friend two years ago that i wanted to start a substack, she replied, “that sounds fun!” i could tell in the back of her voice she didn’t think i was actually going to do it, but when i say i am going to do something, i do it. i am deliriously happy that i have continued to write this messy, typo-ridden, rambly newsletter for two years. and more importantly, THANK YOU FOR READING IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

(this was extremely self-congratulatory and self-referential.. i am are! i am not going to apologize for that in an effort to stop apologizing so much… but you get the idea.)

xoxoxoxoxo