you need minerals

diary :: go outside

from a sweet hang with LA legend @weirdomusicforever

Almost exactly a year ago, I left Los Angeles after the fires swept through the city, and my whole life changed again overnight. I went to Mexico. When I think about last January, my only real thought is how much I slept. I slept and slept and slept. Looking back, it’s obvious to me that I was triggered and traumatized, but what unfolded were many happy and joyful months. I found real healing and peace, even though I hardly knew anyone, and spent a lot of time alone. I did hot yoga and ate mangos. Mostly, I walked around and listened to music in my headphones, hung out with my dog. In a particular way, I didn’t really want to be overly social. I needed to be alone.

This time really confirmed and cemented a lot of my nascent beliefs about well being, everything reduced to the most basic elements: you need minerals, and sunlight and water, fresh fruit and cheese and meat, touch, dance, sex, time with friends, time alone, time asleep. You have to party with good people, and not go to bed because you’re so having so much fun, you have to sleep in and drink good coffee. You need to go outside and have your bare feet touch dirt and sand and grass, and be in fresh water and salt water. You need to smile at babies and dogs, call a friend. You have to walk and walk until you walk all the way into a new life. Most of these things cost hardly anything, but somehow, are often hard to weave into the complexity of the day to day. I’ve been spending a lot of time on screens lately, and feel my body collapsing and folding into itself, my shoulders progressively climbing higher into my ears. I think to myself, I am stressed, but when I ask myself why, it all seems so stupid: the best things in life, if you are lucky, are often readily available. And still I forget.

It’s January, and it’s Thursday at time of writing, a day of the week, I always think to myself, that feels like the color of a bruise. Evidently, the year of the horse doesn’t start until February 17th, a fact I repeat to everyone regardless of if they’re listening or not. There’s a feeling of threading the needle right now for the second half of the decade, wondering what’s next. My deepest fear is that nothing will ever change, but somehow it always does. All my love, wherever you are. And once again, resharing a playlist I made for the end of the year, which is, of course, also the beginning :)

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I’m Mary Bryce, a songwriter & artist. Please check out my about section for more about this newsletter. To share & subscribe is a beautiful thing. Thanks. 🤎

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