1. Keeping a gun in the fridge
Cold comfort. Something about the juxtaposition of dairy and death. Safety on, mind off. You pour soy milk over your cereal and remember you have options.
2. Tzatziki with lamb
White paste, ancient meat. Feels erotic to me. Like if oral history had a taste. I eat it while reading about empire collapse.
3. We Were Liars (TV show)
The aestheticisation of amnesia. Pretty corpses who can’t remember if they’re metaphors. I watched it and remembered nothing but felt incredible.
4. The Naked and Famous
New Zealanders making American moods. This is what the internet sounded like before it was evil. I listen when I want to hallucinate a future I didn’t get.
5. Phantogram
If a synth had social anxiety. It’s music for pacing. For performing femininity in the mirror. For remembering your Tumblr password.
6. White Chocolate Reese’s Cups
Too pale. Too sweet. Too much. I eat them like I’m trying to become less of a person and more of a concept.
7. True crime documentaries
What we put on when I want to feel safe. Death becomes a bedtime story. I fall asleep to strangled women because it’s easier than a rom-com.
8. Vaping a lot
Digital breathing. It gives me the illusion of rhythm. Like I’m in control of my lungs. Like I choose the fog.
9. Selena Gomez (2010–2018)
I relate deeply.
10. Chunky basketball sneakers
Heavy-footed girlhood. Like walking around with your own father issues laced up tight. A style choice made to be misunderstood.
11. Tequila neats and mojitos
I drink to taste the decision. One is punishment. The other is pornographic denial. Both make me say things I shouldn’t.
12. Gun fingers and peace signs
This is how we communicate now. Threats as poses. Surrender as content. Emoji dialect.
13. “False pleasure breeds genuine pain”
The thesis of June. I had a good time and now I hate myself. As it should be.
14. Big ugly mum sunglasses
To shield my eyes from reflection. To make myself unreadable. You wear these when you want to be mistaken for someone else.
15. Pink drinks and purple flowers
Hyperfemininity as espionage. It’s not a vibe, it’s a tactic. I dress like a Bratz doll to steal information.
16. Shake It Up and Disney Channel humour
Neural rewiring courtesy of laugh tracks. This is why I don’t understand intimacy. This is why I flirt like a sitcom dad.
17. Mermaids and fairies
Mythical creatures that never pay rent. They represent my entire financial strategy. And yes, I still believe in them.
18. Addison
An archetype, a cautionary tale, a lowercase god. Addison as noun, verb, ideology. I saw her in a dream and she told me to dye my hair and destroy something beautiful.
19. My First Book by Honor Levy
The holy text. A manual for girls who think too fast and cry on escalators. After reading it, I started underlining my own thoughts.
20. The Child Star
She lives inside me. Precocious and ruined. Performing for nobody. Getting older but not taller. I miss her every day.
21. Mango Monster
Yellow death syrup. I drink it when I want to feel like a cartoon villain with heart palpitations.
22. Buffalo hot sauce
This is what honesty tastes like. Spicy and a little pathetic. I put it on eggs and pretend I’m fine.
24. Avocados and lemon juice
Fat and acid. Everything I am. A breakfast that pretends to be healing while quietly making you worse.
25. Basketball
I don’t watch it. I don’t play it. But I love how it sounds. Like something bouncing away from you. Okay. I love to play it too.
26. Applying to modelling agencies and getting rejected
A controlled experiment in masochism. Every no feels like a yes to my martyr complex. I don’t want to be scouted. I want to be misunderstood.
27. The Code (movie)
The first film made about real people. Peter and Dasha are stars.
28. Casey Frey
Performance as psychosis. Masculinity in motion. I watch his videos like they’re medicine. Placebo effect but hotter.
29. Nymphmet Alumni podcast
Sounds like gossip but feels like theory. Every episode is a voicemail from your smarter friend who once shoplifted from a Christian gift store.
30. Indie Rokkers by MGMT
Played this while deleting thoughts. While breaking up with no one. While looking in the mirror and seeing five different versions of myself, none of them alive.
31. Amma Crellin
I think about her when I say “I’m fine.” I think about her when I brush my hair 40 times in silence. I think about her when I lie.
32. The Evil Urge
A condition, not a symptom. Something you feel in your teeth, behind your eyes, in the scrolling finger. The urge to ruin it all just to see what happens next.