There's snow where I am as I write this, enough that the ground is still covered, enough that I have spent most of the last five days indoors. January marks the start of a new year on the calendar, and yet these are the cold and the dark days, days meant to be spent quietly, resting, waiting, feeding ourselves--not rushing, not starting over, not getting everything done all at once.
There's also ache in the air as I write this, ache in anticipation of what's to come and what has been leading us here; ache in the urgency of tethering to our communities, in facing together the unknown and the ugliness, being present, open, strong.
I am not very good at resting. I am not very good at feeding myself.
On December 31st I drew cards to consider for 2025: The High Priestess, The Sun. A few days later, from another deck, I pulled a card: The High Priestess, again. The message I'm receiving is perhaps in opposition to the action I am taking in writing this letter now, a year since the last one--a fucking year! did y'all miss me?--giving away again a piece of myself, because I interpreted these cards to mean now is the time for me to be turning inward, maintaining mystery, following my intuition, coming to better trust and understand myself in order to discover and share my light. Perhaps this reading was more about remembering duality: where there is light there is darkness, and in darkness light, and I am not myself if I am without an audience; I am both the performer onstage and the quiet self in the wings the moment just after.
We might be entering into a darker era soon, and in order to reach and receive the light, we'll need to be able to trust the safety of the webs we are building in corners--we'll need to be able to trust the presence of our communities, we'll need to be able to look inward and trust ourselves. A space in which we can find light and community and trust one another? Writing. Art.
So I've been absent from your inbox for so long some might call it ghosting. So we've been absent from social media in nearly every regard. But with our absence in these avenues there has been consistent, loving presence behind the scenes: Emma and I saw each other in person for the first time in four and a half years at AWP in Kansas City (I could write endlessly on how spectacularly beautiful this shared time and space was, but I will just leave it as it was truly fucking glorious); we worked for the first time with readers, discussing submissions for Issue 04 with new minds; we laughed together on Zoom, we shared photos of our dogs, we talked on the phone for hours one night when I was housesitting, we talked haircuts and nail polish and books we were reading and heartbreaks and dreams. Returning to this space, to playing this role of being present as editor of a literary journal feels natural, necessary, good. We were here all along; I was here all along. Perhaps for a little while, we were the cobwebs in the basement rather than the lightbulb.
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The grand update you've all been waiting for is that Issue 04 of The Champagne Room is, in fact, forthcoming. We are so excited to share more words by more writers with you this spring. Until then, as always, our previous issues are available for purchase; we also, as always, have a library featuring conversations with past contributors.
Stay warm and be kind. Keep a light on for me; I'll be around.
Love and Light,
Heather
Founder and Co-Editor, The Champagne Room
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