#100 - Happy Anniversary Smoke Show!
or: a celebration of me & my work
Hey hi hello smokeshow-ers!
(Gotta put the hyphen otherwise it looks a little too much like showers tbh.)
It’s May 15 & the second annual Smoke Show-aversary! It’s been two whole years since I worried myself about the pressure of debut before acquiescing to my most basic instincts and posting about the single greatest season of reality television of all time, NYC Prep.
If I had a definable brand, I would say I was very much on it at the time.
Now, did I know why I was starting this thing at the time? No!
But my body knew because the body always knows before the brain. And I followed my instincts because I was really determined at the time to create a piece of the world that was mine, that I was the only one responsible for.
And then it, uh, evolved. I went from sporadic captures to sending one every Friday, a promise I have been mostly consistent in keeping for the last 18 months.
I always say that this substack has no theme—but in conversation this morning I realized that actually this place has serves as an unintended archive of my journey to build self-worth. One week at a time!
Here’s stuff I care about, and I think that my caring about it matters, and maybe if I explain it correctly, it will (even temporarily) matter to you too.
See I could tell I was deeply unhappy with where my life was when I started this thing. I had no idea how to fix it—but I knew & know that writing is one of the only positive solutions I have when I feel out of control. (It’s like waaaay better than not eating.)
So I started taking morning walks and writing in my journal (three pages a day which sometimes took me a full hour because my attention span was SO shot at the time) and hitting send on these essays. And now, two years later, here we are at the hundredth one! Something I would never have known if I didn’t follow through on my random urge to number all of these two weeks ago!
At this point, I really want to thank you, dear reader, for reading these!! It’s honestly something I’ll never quite get over and I don’t know how to convey my sincerity as much as I would hope to because my fingers are literally curling in embarrassment as I write this!!
But it’s wild to me that you’re here, and it really means a lot. Whether you’re a new reader or someone who signed up on day dot, thank you thank you thank you, I definitely wouldn’t still be writing these without you reading them!
So, in honor of that, I thought it would be a fun reflective time to make a list of some of my favorite ‘stacks over the last two years!
#8 - Help help, I learned the names of the BTS boys
Honestly, one of my favorite things to go back and read because I just want to gently cup past-me’s head in my hands and whisper that she has no fucking clue what she’s just unlocked.
Biiiiig tip of the iceberg vibes with this one.
Two years later, my love for them has just continued to grow. Last month I went to see the Suga | Agust D concert and I have simply had too many feelings to figure out how to talk about what it meant to me (which is such a rarity it’s almost wonderful to be overwhelmed in this way!).
But being in a room with 15,000 other people chanting “I love, I love, I love myself. I know, I know, I know myself.” was a deeply moving experience and I’m just so grateful that I clicked on that Butter video two years ago and it led me to all the far-reaching places it has.
#14 - Objectively, who is the most fuckable of our last 10 presidents?
A classic “this deserved more”. This essay marked my return to self & substack after The Big Breakup of 2021 and I think it’s some of the most straightforward comedy writing I’ve done on here.
Political commentary meets unabashedly silly takes while also acknowledging how influential sexuality is to politics? Sounds like classic Claire!
Also, I fully stand by these rankings!
When I used to co-host a movie podcast, my friend clocked the three elements of a movie that, if present, I would mention without fail: dancing, the aeronautics industry, and Ireland. I feel like with the substack the three are: my love of public transportation, the feeling that my time is being wasted/stolen for profit, and my resentment of the boardroom-born notion of endless growth.
This essay was my first line in the sand about cars and what actual luxury is outside of capitalistic measures and I’m still regularly checking my consumption against this paradigm.
Oh baby one of the things I’m proudest of is just how many people I’ve influenced into journaling via this Substack!
This essay is a capture of one-line-per-day from an early journal was one of my favorite exercises—and one that I’ve never been able to do again because a self-imposed journaling rule is that I never want to write them with the intention of turning it into something else.
(I just think it’s really important, especially as society emphasizes sharing all of our thoughts publicly so that they can be turned into data points to sell us stuff, to have private reflections and thoughts I sit with before sharing.)
Writing six pages a day absolutely made me a better writer and honestly way better person. And this isn’t an essay so I’m arbitrarily not listing it in the main list, but the podcast I did about journaling with my sister is one of my favorite things I’ve ever produced and if you’ve never listened but wanted to start journaling/morning pages/a diary it’s a great starting place! (And/or check out my 6 rules for journaling which is a literal list and an hour-long podcast!)
#38 - A letter to myself, six months ago
If there’s one thing I’ve had to admit throughout writing these, it’s that I am an incredibly earnest person.
I deeply believe that the way we speak to and about ourselves is incredibly powerful and I used to hold so much shame around who I was and how cringey and embarrassing past-me acted. But nothing would have broken 16-year-old-me’s heart like knowing that 30-year-old-me was ashamed of her. Like, that girlie was just trying her best to make it through and not even future me can honor her for that?!!
Giving myself grace, but also understanding that I am in control and my life can look radically different six months from now carried me through a lot of the more tumultuous moments of the past few years.
And I AM cheesy and that’s uh, okay! That’s fine actually there’s literally no harm in being unabashedly myself.
#48 - It's Good That Al Franken Resigned, Actually
Holding abusers accountable is actually the least we can do and asking the question of who gets to get away with abuse is actually such a bonkers question to ask rather than focusing on how we can root out the rot of society that surrounds terrible men!
Also, I think we should hold people accountable when they knowingly look away from abuse.
Also also, Al Franken got to test-host The Daily Show like a month ago so whatever “cancel culture” argument all his fans knotted themselves up in their attempts to make is uh, patently false.
#58 - Oh THAT'S Where My Waist Is
I’m fat and I’ve always been fat and it took me 29 years to cultivate a wardrobe that made me excited to leave the house so I wrote about it! The clothing choices are somewhat abysmal for us fat folk but I knew that it was a huge gap in the “how I see myself vs. how others perceive me vs. who I actually am” triangle and closing that gap continues to feel amazing!
#89 - The Power of a Perfect French Fry
I’ve been having a streak of incredible sunday’s and I am so glad I captured one of the absolute best ones.
I think there’s obviously a lot of value in writing about traditionally profound experiences, but there’s something very lovely to me about this slice of life and capturing some of my favorite parts of my friendship and New York City. A place I love so much and truly can’t believe I reside in even though it’s been like almost five years since I moved back!
Things used to be better, which gives me a lot of hope that they can be again.
Plus, my favorite celebrity moment that so succinctly illustrates the artistic hollowness of the Marvel franchises!
#96 - Gun Control & the Third Party Paradox
I want more than two parties in my government, I want real choice, and I want to take everyone’s guns away! It really is that simple!!
Sometimes these ‘stacks go out after multiple careful drafts, and other times it follows the old SNL adage of “it doesn’t go out because it’s ready, it goes out because it’s [Friday]" and both have served the purpose of allowing me to say: here! I did it! I wrote a whole thing and hit send!
And now I’ve done that 100 times. And some of them are duds—and I say that really lovingly—and because of the law of statistics, 49 of these are below average, but that’s honestly so wonderful. That means I have 49 that are above average as well. (I’ve always loved that another word for average is mean. I’m also not 100% confident this is how math works but I like how it sounds!) (By the way, the median? That honor goes to #50 - Five Ways I Found Joy Today, an essay I wrote right after the fall of Roe because I needed to remind myself that joy is possible even in the worst circumstances!)
I really love having this collection, I can’t believe there are 100 of these things out there, I’m so proud that I created in public without apologizing for it, and truly thank you again for indulging me and being here for it!!
I used to be someone who eschewed celebrating milestones, and in hindsight, I think that was a self-sabotage tactic. Especially things like never celebrating an anniversary during the seven years I was in that relationship—part of that was not wanting to ask to do it, part of it was avoiding the letdown if my ex didn’t show up the way I was hoping, but the most significant chunk was my absent self-worth who never thought I deserved that kind of attention. And because I couldn’t accept it, I wasn’t sure how to give it either.
But I’m trying to get better at accepting compliments. And giving them to myself.
Obviously, humility is important, but I think there’s something to be said about the poor social etiquette of rejecting someone’s positive observations of me or my work because it feels instinctual to deny it.
(It’s not an easy thing to practice naturally, because mentioning it feels like the worst-disguised request in the world.)
I know that my natural disposition is to mark events for people. To show up with something, even a small token of celebration. Because I can see that we tend to rush through everything these days.
Art is ephemeral, but it’s also incredibly permanent. Conversations are so saturated because they happen in the pressure-cooker of social media so by the time we form an opinion, someone else has already contributed it and it feels futile to express our opinion when so many others already have. So we move on. But I think stopping to capture and understand informs more than just the creation of an artifact.
By understanding ourselves, our reactions, and our motivations, we can parse a plan for the future that leads to genuine pleasure and seeks joyful lives that aren’t soggy with regret of opportunities not taken, weighed down by opinions we’re too frightened to express.
And maybe I have to repeat the lessons I’m learning over and over again until they stick with me and maybe writing is my best chance at making that true.
Anyway! I did all of this! And if I hadn’t, the time would have passed anyway, so I’m really proud I have something to show for it.
&& here’s to one hundred more!!
*cheers* *clink* *glass breaking sounds*
