Dear Somebody: A monster inside the wall.

An illustration for ANYWAY Magazine (2026)

A year from now, here are five things from this week that I'd like to remember:

MONDAY 

Life with F is loud. At almost three, she defaults to screaming as her primary manner of communication, and the screaming is loud. Wrong plate color? Screaming. Bath too hot? Screaming. Having too much fun? Screaming. I try to be patient, to emotionally detach, but my nervous system thins, teetering. The flood of constant sound—of unreasonable discontent, is overwhelming. I find myself constantly tip-toeing around her tiny being, flinching at her every movement. I feel trapped by the creature I created. 

Each evening, I wait for F to fall asleep. I want to return our house to the night, to let it infuse our walls with its calm and its silence. Instead, F screams and cries and wails: there’s a monster living inside her wall. She’s never been afraid of much, and a large part of me files monster under manipulation, but a smaller part of me, the part who is still afraid, stresses about leaving F alone in a room with her fear. 

After the fourth check-in, when all I can think about is my workout and my shower, when my only consideration is how my own bedtime is ticking farther and farther away, I close F’s door. I walk one, two, three feet away into my own 100-year-old bedroom, crammed so closely to hers, and listen to her wails. I think about how I left F alone in a room with her fear. I separate my childhood from my parenting, I remember that no single choice I make will affect her too greatly. 

T walks in smiling; he’s been reading about tulips. He tells me about how, in Persian culture, tulips symbolize the brevity of life. From the moment their strong leaves poke through the soil, it’s a rapid progression towards death: quickly they bloom; quickly they dazzle; quickly we breathe in their sweet scent. Quickly they fall, petal by petal, back into the soil again. 

My favorite flower is a tulip. They remind me of time capsules, planted only to be forgotten. I love the idea of burying what I love most in the earth. I like that they often arrive before spring, a jolt of joy at the very moment when winter feels too long. Most of all, for no particular reason I can identify, I like their shape.

Tonight has been long. F screams all through bath, all through pajamas, all through books. She sobs and throws a book; she sobs and throws her jewelry; she sobs and swats at me with tiny hands I’m afraid of. After I throw her into her crib and switch off the light, she finally quiets. There’s a monster inside the wall, she says. Can you stay for a little bit?

Though her eyes brim with mischief, I sit on the floor next to her crib. She soothes herself by petting Tuna, her penguin, then takes my hand and shows me how. After a few minutes, she falls asleep, her hand on top of mine, mine on top of Tuna. 

I consider the brevity of life. The moment I’m in right now is already gone. F’s screams are lost to the silence of this night; her nightmare, a petal turning back towards the soil. Perhaps it isn’t so terrible to be needed after all. 

F’s body moves quietly, a tiny stem braced against the late-winter wind. I sit on crossed legs for a long time, watching. 

TUESDAY

A few months ago, I was invited to write and illustrate a piece on anxiety for NYC-based youth magazine, ANYWAY. The pleasure I receive from writing these pieces is paramount. Nothing can be accomplished or enjoyed in life without a sound mind and grounded heart, so I take this work seriously—and I’m grateful for independent publications that provide guidance that wasn’t as readily available to me as a kid. 

In the Know: Anxiety for ANYWAY Magazine (2026)

In the Know: Anxiety for ANYWAY Magazine (2026)

I also created a coloring page and two journal exercises designed to help adolescents calm their bodies, align their breath, and refocus their minds during periods of stress or overwhelm. All three were derived from exercises found in Learn to Let Go: A Journal for New Beginnings.

Coloring and journal pages for ANYWAY Magazine (2026)

Journaling exercise for ANYWAY Magazine (2026)

December 2025/January 2026 issue of ANYWAY Magazine

Thank you to ANYWAY founder Jen for a fun and importance assignment, and for including my work in these pages. 

WEDNESDAY

I’m reading Brian Selznick’s illustrated version of Live Oak with Moss, a collection of 12 poems by Walt Whitman about his affection for other men; I am listening to Bad Bunny’s TinyDesk again and again; I love this book of drawings Heidi Griffiths made of her children. 

THURSDAY

Studio desk on February 19, 2026 (2026)

A photo from my studio as I work on wrapping up the interior art for Dear Library. Messy, full of mistakes, and long stretches of quiet work. The scratch scratch scratch of pen against paper; the strange, metallic smell of fresh watercolor paint; the white noise of my space heater; the various audiobooks I dip in and out of, droning on and on. I’ll miss this project when it’s done. 

FRIDAY

We would climb the highest dune,
from there to gaze and come down:
the ocean was performing;
we contributed our climb.

Waves leapfrogged and came
straight out of the storm.
What should our gaze mean?
Kit waited for me to decide.

Standing on such a hill,
what would you tell your child?
That was an absolute vista.
Those waves raced far, and cold.

'How far could you swim, Daddy,
in such a storm?'
'As far as was needed,' I said,
and as I talked, I swam.

—With Kit, Age 7, At The Beach by William Stafford

• Dear Somebody: Nothing, Nothing (February 14, 2025)

Of all the things you can put in front of your eyes, I’m grateful that my little letter is one of them. 

If you’d like to support me, please buy my books. My art prints and line of greeting cards make excellent gifts for yourself or a friend. You can also hire me for your next project—I’d love to work together. 

xx,
M

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Dear Somebody: I'm on my way.

River Thames (London, 2025)

A year from now, here are five things from this week that I'd like to remember:

MONDAY 

After our standard London breakfast (coffee from Tamp, chocolate croissant from Gail’s, a banana from the street vendor) we walk to the train and board for Blackfriars. We’re going to Tate Modern to meet Honee, a friend I made in 2022 when she attended our Visual Journaling retreat in the south of France. 

I haven’t seen her since then, but our time together feels easy. We catch up on our present lives and then we visit our past ones: I learn about her childhood and upbringing, we exchange notes on our familial relationships, on art-making, on daily evolution. When we hug goodbye, it doesn’t feel like it’ll be for the last time. 

Afterwards, I meet up with T and the girls and we venture into the Tate Modern bookstore. I haven’t stepped inside this gorgeous room since 2019, and the selection is always so tempting: dozens and dozens of beautiful books, all of which I want to purchase and take back home. 

T immediately spots Start Where You Are on the shelves and excitedly shows our girls. He makes such a big deal out of it that I feel sheepish. I feel demure—after all, it’s been a full decade since this, my first book, was published—does it still deserve such fanfare? My relationship with deserve is a sticky one, conflated with dangerous notions of self-worth and how I must earn it. 

Start Where You Are: A Journal for Self-Exploration (2015!)

It’s been 10 years since Start Where You Are was published—with well over a million copies in print, it’s sold hundreds of thousands of copies worldwide, has been translated into a dozen languages, and continues to help people all over this earth learn more about themselves. Seeing that it’s still stocked in one of the most prestigious museums in the world, a decade later, is validating. 

Finding Start Where You Are at Tate Moden with N and F :) (2025)

This book changed my life. It began my career as an author; it invited me into the world of publishing—and allowed me to build my life around my love of books; it gave me my first real reason to take a chance on me. It has a very dear place in my heart, and if I consider it quite clearly, it’s disappointing to know that over time, I have learned to push all of my achievements away. 

Luckily, T forces me to recognize my success, regularly, and for that I am grateful. Celebrating this book with my young girls is beautiful. I’m grateful for the chance to show them, first hand, that making things from the heart, with honesty and integrity, can take you to incredible places—to places that once, they weren’t even allowed to go. 

I want to raise young girls who don’t feel the constant need to minimize their achievements, and believing that I deserve good things is fundamental for doing that. Believing that I deserve good things is hard—but I’m on my way. 

TUESDAY

I’m On My Way by Ben Kweller, obviously, for the aforementioned reasons. 

WEDNESDAY

A peek into N’s London sketchbook, which was made inside an actual sketchbook but also on various paper menus throughout the neighborhood. This one, that she made while we had lunch at Franco Manca’s with a dear old friend, is one of my favorites:

N’s London sketchbook (2025)

THURSDAY

A few sketchbook pages from my time in London, including (in order): St. James’ park, colors as memories, the girls walking to Homefield Park, N in front of a cobbled doorway, and the greens of London.

London sketchbook (2025)

London sketchbook (2025)

FRIDAY

Starting here, what do you want to remember?
How sunlight creeps along a shining floor?
What scent of old wood hovers, what softened
sound from outside fills the air?

Will you ever bring a better gift for the world
than the breathing respect that you carry
wherever you go right now? Are you waiting
for time to show you some better thoughts?

When you turn around, starting here, lift this
new glimpse that you found; carry into evening
all that you want from this day. This interval you spent
reading or hearing this, keep it for life –

What can anyone give you greater than now,
starting here, right in this room, when you turn around?

—You Reading This, Be Ready by William Stafford

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A year ago, these were the five things I most wanted to remember:

Dear Somebody: I am not a machine. (September 6, 2024)
Dear Somebody: Losing a penguin. (September 20, 2024)

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See you next week!

xx,

M

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To sign up for my weekly newsletter, Dear Somebody, please subscribe here.

Dear Somebody: The way it is.

A year from now, here are five things from this week that I'd like to remember:

MONDAY 

“There’s a 23-year-old girl in my MFA cohort that I secretly admire. Daniela’s an excellent illustrator, very technically skilled, and her work shows an emotional depth that resonates deeply with me. We begin sitting together at lunch, and though her company is welcome, it quickly becomes clear that we couldn’t be more different. She’s outgoing and open-hearted; I am reserved and overly critical. She drips with the confidence only youth can bestow; I am anxious, intimidated by my own expectations and what a younger cohort thinks of me. Motherhood has stripped me of my confidence. The reality of being thrown into a powerful role that’s impossible to prepare for has me questioning what, if anything, I’m qualified to offer—to a friend, fellow student, and of course, my own child.

Daniela is comfortable with vulnerability. In each conversation, she invites me into another part of herself—her dreams, her ambitions, her own insecurities, and mistakes. She asks me for advice about relationships and building her career. She is genuinely curious about my experience with marriage and parenthood. I’m not familiar with a lot of her vocabulary—like a true millennial, I have trouble understanding the shorthand Generation Z slips into so easily. When I ask her to define a word she uses, she laughs at me gently, like a sibling. I feel at ease, comfortable in her company, starkly aware that the only person she wants me to be is myself. 

Often, I think about how easily this friendship could’ve passed me by; it was only through a small crack in the door of my heart that she came through.”

—excerpted from An Open Heart, an essay on friendship I recently wrote for issue #57 of Taproot Magazine

TUESDAY

This embroidered version of The Wind in the Willows by Rachel Sumpter that I bought months ago. I have yet to begin my own embroidery project, but this sits on our dining table (buried under a heap of N’s own paintings) patiently waiting for me; reminding me there is still time. 

WEDNESDAY

My days pulse with an air of desperation: I am uncomfortably aware that time is passing with rapid speed—that although the days feel long, full of to-do lists and diapers and laundry and tears—they are, in fact, steamrolling right through me. 

My child turns into a young girl before my very eyes, my infant into a curious baby; my body fails me not because it is weak but because it is neglected; my art won’t make itself and no one, other than me, needs me to make it; I will always, always fall short of my own aim and expectation; I cannot have it all, full stop, most likely—but I definitely cannot have it all at once. My brain agrees that there is a season for everything; my body does not physically understand it. My blood courses with agitation. 

I find comfort, as always, in all the familiar places:

“People always ask me how I managed to paint when my two boys were small. My children were a joy to me, and there was no problem working with them around—I just let them play at my feet as I painted. They would even run toy fire engines up and down my easel, but it didn't bother me. The only problem was how to keep them safe when we were doing field work, such as plowing with the horse. Once on a TV interview I was asked about this and I said, "Oh, we just tied them to a tree." When I listened to the program later, I was horrified.” —Dahlov Ipcar

“It’s my belief that even the freest, most single and childless writers rarely do more than four hours of intense writing a day. I do the same, but I just have much less spare time to waste. In order to write, I cut out a lot of things: reading the newspapers, for example. I listen to the radio, because you can do that while cleaning. And I have to avoid all social media and most daytime emailing. But I have also absolutely given up on the idea of peace and quiet as being necessary to writing. I just don’t allow myself to think about that.” —Zadie Smith

“I used to have these acres of time. And I didn’t particularly realize that until they went away. But one of the things that I at least have found from having a child is it’s not ever just one way. For a while it will feel like there’s no time, and then time will feel expansive again. And then there will be times when I don’t even want to write because it’s just kind of completely compelling to me to be doing other things. And then there will be other times where I feel like if I can’t write and have time to myself, I’m going to scream. But kids are so funny, too. They’re much more fun than most of the things I did when I was just a depressive-freak single person.” —Jenny Offill

THURSDAY

“To love, to be loved. To never forget your own insignificance. To never get used to the unspeakable violence and vulgar disparity of the life around you. To seek joy in the saddest places. To pursue beauty to its lair. To never simplify what is complicated or complicate what is simple. To respect strength, never power. Above all to watch. To try and understand. To never look away. And never, never to forget.” 

—from Arundhati Roy’s Azadi

FRIDAY

There’s a thread you follow. It goes among
things that change. But it doesn’t change.
People wonder about what you are pursuing.
You have to explain about the thread.
But it is hard for others to see.
While you hold it you can’t get lost.
Tragedies happen; people get hurt
or die; and you suffer and get old.
Nothing you do can stop time’s unfolding.
You don’t ever let go of the thread.

—The Way It Is by William Stafford

xx,

M

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