So long, Substack — hello beehiiv

Platform migration alert and a tiny explanation of my absence here

Long time, no newsletter.

I come to you with two updates.

First, I’ve had a mental block about writing a newsletter. Something very awful happened to me and my family the first week of this year and I have felt immense pressure to write something tragic and beautiful about it. I keep trying to squeeze out a piece of writing I’m happy with and I’ve been avoiding typing instead.

But it turns out a pressure cooker doesn’t turn the coal of trauma into a diamond. At least that method hasn’t been working for me. I feel like I have to write about it because otherwise it feels like a secret, a secret so big it touches my life every day and has radically reoriented my every action. This year has been particularly difficult for many people, and also I have had a particularly difficult time — that of course in my community isn’t that unique, but outside of it is quite unimaginable — and I feel I need to address the flaming elephant in the room.

But that’s stopping me from writing! So I am just going to move on. I think some distance and targeted mental health treatment is a necessary precondition to diving into this specific creative well.

Second, I am migrating data + feelings off of Substack. Sometime over the next week you will get an email from jazzmyth@mail.beehiiv.com after I port your subscription over. I’m excited about the possibilities of this new platform and at the same time have been overwhelmed with the functionality.

I’m still going to send missives on the messiness of being a working journalist today, and how to operate when we are full of data and full of feelings. My first newsletter on beehiiv will reflect on how my work has changed this year.

Thank you for sticking with me. It’s okay if this is where we part ways. Take care of yourself today.