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Hi everybody. Happy New Year.
I can tell 2026 is going to be the best year ever because nothing objectively horrible and unimaginably awful has happened yet. It’s all been sunshine and rainbows everywhere.
I, for one, am bringing a squeaky clean slate into the new year. New year, new me. 2025 Alexa? Never heard of her. I want to be unrecognizable.
The sky is also green. And I’ve decided I don’t like Wicked anymore. And I actually don’t think Jonathan Bailey is that attractive, and I’ve never really liked guacamole. And I’m definitely not craving a Kale Caesar right now. (A lot of green was mentioned unintentionally in there.)
Okay, so onto the truth. Sorry for the jumpscare. Jonathan Bailey, if you’re reading this, you are the sexiest man of every year.
I woke up on New Year’s Eve with congestion and a sore throat that would later grow into the worst head cold I’ve had in recent years.
I hit my head so badly the other day that I thought I had a concussion.
Before that, I read ‘A Battle With My Blood,’ a New Yorker essay written by Tatiana Schlossberg, the recently deceased granddaughter of John F. Kennedy and Jacqueline Kennedy, daughter of Caroline Kennedy and Edwin Schlossberg, wife of George Moran, mother of Edwin and Josephine, and sister to Rose and Jack. They’ve all been in my thoughts and heart lately, along with the rest of Tatiana’s friends and family.
Tatiana was my classmate at The Brearley School. She was a few years older than me, but we shared a piano teacher. (Ironically, the same piano teacher whose daughter I would one day teach in fourth grade at my alma mater.) I didn’t recall our shared history until I saw a group photo featuring the two of us among others, at The Brearley School.
Two years ago, I faced an absurd number of deaths in my personal life while also watching friends and acquaintances mourn loved ones whom I’ve never met. I learned a lot about grief during that season. I learned that it is entirely possible to mourn the losses of those we didn’t know well, or didn’t know at all. I learned how grief can sneak up on us.
I’ve learned that one death can often remind us of another, expanding and often complicating our grief. For example, my Aunt Eileen passed away over a decade ago, yet I’ve missed her more these past few years than ever.
I’ve learned that life is fragile, unpredictable, and urgent.
My capacity for grief and compassion as we collectively walk eachother home knows no bounds. My empathy is infinite.
Our time on earth is not.
It’s tricky, being someone who has had suicidal ideations and now fears death — the very thing I used to imagine as an escape.
I’ve learned that life will never be done breaking my heart, and that I have to continue to let it break over and over again.
Brandi Carlile was 100% right when she sangIt’s no fun to have a heart when we are living through these days.
I’ve learned that I have to surround myself with people who feel it all, so that my sensitive soul has room to breathe.
Cynthia Erivo described writing her first memoir as “an excursion of truth-telling,” and I have never loved a phrase more. It’s what I’m trying to do here, inside The Nuance Diaries every time I write to you — set out on an excursion of truth-telling. I’m never here to bullshit you, except in that opening paragraph, which was 1000% sarcasm, which I hope you caught on to. Dark humor is part of my survival kit.
Resilience is essential and absurd.
I wrote that down during the final few acts of The Seat Of Our Pants, a new musical that debuted at the Public Theater. I watched my insanely talented, deeply kind friend, Geena Quintos, perform alongside Ruthie Ann Miles, one of the most resilient people in this world. In her own words, “Ruthie dedicates herself to the memory of her children, Abigail and Sophia.” She calls her youngest child, Hope, “a little lighthouse.”
I’ve always loved lighthouses. I think that the act of writing itself has been my lighthouse over the years. Other people’s words have certainly been my lighthouse. I sometimes can’t believe that my own words have been a lighthouse of sorts to readers and audiences, on pages and stages.
I used to say that writing is how I try to make sense of this sharp, messy world, but often, there is no sense to be made. Often, all we have is the light in front of us and our feet beneath us.
You know what doesn’t make sense? I sat down to write to you about how I had no idea what to write this week, and somehow all of this poured out of me.
What makes even less sense? My day today was therapy + finding out that an ICE agent shot a woman in the face in Minnesota, just blocks from where George Floyd was murdered.
My mind drifted to the summer of 2020. And then to the fall of 2024, Sonya Massey was shot to death in her own kitchen. I read about that while making pasta in my kitchen. Just like I read about Breonna Taylor while lying in my own bed.
Why do I love this place that’s never loved me?
Those words, sung by Cynthia Erivo, keep ringing truer and truer.
I say ‘I hate it here’ a lot. And I sometimes mean it.
This country is full of boundless cruelty and unspeakable, deplorable, heartless people who just seem to want to torture us all, and they all happen to be in charge.
And yet, this is also where my dear friends got married, in one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever been in my life, in the Hudson Valley, a short ride from the school we all met at over a decade ago.
And it’s also where I got called the ‘n’ word for the first time in Portland, Oregon.
And it’s also where we had perhaps the most historic inauguration since Obama on January 1st, right here in New York City. (If you haven’t watched Mayor Mamdani’s speech along with Public Advocate Jumaane Williams and Comptroller Mark Levine, I highly recommend it. I cried.)
(I sometimes try to pretend that New York City is not part of America, and I’m working on that. Kind of.)
If you can’t already tell, I did not sit down to write today with a clear topic or ‘message’ on my mind. I really, truly just thought,
Fuck. Today is hard. Insane, really. It’s January 7th, and 2026 has been unspeakably hard. I don’t think I have anything to say. But I also feel like I need to say something. I want to bury myself under my Costco blanket, watch Golden Girls, and eat Kale Caesar salad. But I also want people to know it’s okay to feel messy and awful and out of control right now. It is not normal that we have to hear about vile tragedies and then just go on with our days as if nothing happened. That’s not normal. I hate the word ‘normal,’ yet none of this is normal.
I guess what I really wanted to do was hop on here and be honest, and give you permission to be honest too. I’m forever hoping that my vulnerability can be not a blueprint, but a permission slip for yours.
Okay, one last thing. Actually two.
* I want to create space for you to show up and be honest, not just when you’re reading these essays. The idea of ‘being honest’ sounds easy, but it is actually hard. Hence, the permission slips.
I used to host this weekly drop-in group called ‘Authenticity Tuesdays,’ and I am bringing it back as….
For an *hour, we’re going to hang out on Zoom and be honest together.
I’ve put together some prompts, but the conversation can go where it wants to.
There are also some old prompts in the archives here on Substack if you want to dig around and see what we talked about last year. Just search ‘Authenticity Tuesdays’
*Well, 75 minutes, but I wasn’t going to call it Honest 75…that would be a fun cocktail name though?
We’ll meet on Tuesday, January 13th, from 7:45 PM - 9 PM.
Use this link to add to your calendar.
Donation of $15 recommended (Venmo AlexaJJ - linked in the invite.)
A year ago, I totally would not have been able to make that donation when I really needed a space like this. ‘Give what you can’ truly means just that — what you can. If you can’t, that is 1000% fine and will not be held against you in any way, shape, or form. Truly, just show up.
Here are the Happy Honest Hour prompts for 1/13 —
* How often are you honest with yourself?
* What does being honest with yourself look and feel like to you?
* What do you need to tell the truth about?
* What have you been bottling up lately?
* How does it feel when you lie to yourself?
* What are the consequences of dishonesty?
* Is there anything you want to be more honest about this year? With yourself or others?
I have a good feeling about this. I think it’s going to be fun. Whether it’s 2 people or 20.
I said I had two last things to say, right? Last thing.
* I’m getting back into art, and it has been a freaking blast. More on that later. I haven’t shown anything I’ve made to anyone yet, and I love that. But since you guys are special…
Take care of yourself. Be so kind to yourself. Drink a warm beverage and be still, as my therapist always tells me.
Talk to you soon, and hopefully SEE you Tuesday for Happy Honest Hour.
PS My New Year’s resolutions are to reduce my own suffering whenever possible, and treat myself as kindly as I treat other people. More on that later for sure.
