Welcome! I got canned and now I'm here.
As of this writing, it’s been three months and four days since I was laid off from my job at Eater. I had worked there as an editor for almost six years, the longest I’d ever worked anywhere.
Since losing my job, two things have continued to resonate. The first is the completely impersonal nature of my dismissal: I was notified by a form email from our publisher, who neglected to address me by name. The second is the idea of redundancy, the term that the British use for unemployment. To be made redundant is to be dismissed because you are no longer needed. While the term applies to job loss, it also encapsulates a more existential fear, particularly once you reach a certain point in life.
I’m 49. It's an age that has historically not boded well for women, job seekers, or really anyone in want of cultural validation for their continued existence. In a way, it’s been impossible for me not to view the concept of redundancy and the means of my dismissal as inextricably connected: I was let go with less care than it takes to remove a piece of lint from a sweater. I was redundant. Redundancy means irrelevance, and irrelevance means that no one has to worry about whether they hurt — to paraphrase the late, great Carrie Fisher — all three of my feelings.
But pity parties are a drag — the drinks are stingy and the food and company suck. So let’s move on.
The other day I read an interview with a former Dictionary.com editor on Melanie Ehrenkranz’s wonderful Substack Laid Off. Ehrenkranz mentioned that layoffs have of late become the “villain origin story” for many creative projects. The editor, who is creating an actual print magazine (god’s work) countered that while layoffs “certainly involve villains,” his magazine is “an accumulation of a lifetime of tastes and interests.”
That’s essentially what this is. In my job at Eater I had a bi-monthly newsletter called Dining In. Its focus was, to court another redundancy, home cooking. I enjoyed writing it, but often found myself wanting to write about my other interests. These can be broadly classified as movies (especially those of the ‘70s through ‘90s and/or aimed at women), the weirdness of getting older while female, books, cookbooks, cultural commentary, home design, dogs, photography, New York, the Barbra Streisand cinematic universe, and my eternal, sometimes perplexing love of Harrison Ford and various other hot, cantankerous men. And, yes, food.
I’m going to try to keep these dispatches brief, i.e. 700 words max, since no one needs another long newsletter. (Or, arguably, any newsletter, but here we are.) Right now I’m planning to post an essay on Tuesdays and a round-up of stuff I like on Fridays. This is, as they like to say on Love Is Blind, an experiment. And for now, at least, it's a free one. We’ll see how it goes. Thanks for being here.
