i'm a brat when i'm blogging that

bloggin' that, bloggin' that, bloggin' that (TW: I talk about my dying dad for a second)

I’m so Julia!

Just kidding! I’m Brooke. This isn’t even a club! This is a blog! There’s not even any cocaine in the bathroom! In fact, there’s no bathroom at all because this is a BLOG. 

I really wish I had something to muse on for you, or could at least provide you with an idea of what this blog is about. All I can say is that I make stuff, and I have been making stuff for as long as I can remember. Art has always been absurdly intertwined with my life due to my mom being unfairly amazing at every art medium on the planet. I know I want to be a better writer, and I really want to finish a book other than NaNoWriMo I shittily crammed together in the 10th grade (note: none of you will ever read that, that nightmare is known only by me and God). 

But honestly I’m just blogging because my friend Emma told me to. She has a blog. We are codependent. I’m just a girl, etc, etc. 

So (hard left) what is a brat summer anyway? 

I am not very brat in concept. I do not club. I do not hard drugs. I do not bumpin’ that. But the concept of being ‘brat’ has taken over the entire internet (including Kamala Harris, if you missed that). I want to be brat too! To not give a fuck and party hard (but in a way where I’m not actually partying at all because I’m a in bed by 9 type).

In truth, my summer so far has not been very brat at all. I went on a very loving and bougie honeymoon with my husband which was followed very shortly with the news that my dad is dying. Then I saw my friends for a deeply meaningful trip to reconnect ourselves with art. Then I became the power of attorney to my dad, who has begun to lose his mind as cancer slowly eats away at his brain matter.

I love high energy club music like brat. There’s something so alluring about the idea of an I-don’t-give-a-fuck attitude. Standing outside a club with a cigarette and flipping the bird to anyone who looks at your funny is a delicious fantasy when your daily life is slowly being consumed with paperwork, healthcare meetings, and driving to see someone who might not be alive the next time you see them. 

I don’t want this whole blog to be about my dad. I’m not a grief blogger, but I am grieving. If I ignored the grief, there would always be a disingenuous, plastic element to my writing for this blog. To put it in brat terms: I am not very 365, I’m in my Apple era. 

So, as we said, I’m not partying. I’m not even having a great time! So I’m trying to give my own definition of what it means to have a “brat summer”. Let’s discuss via bulleted list. 

A brat summer means:

• Writing my cozy romance book god dammit

• Making this blog where ideally I blog about the romance book but I’ll probably just shit post 

• Crocheting obsessively 

• Making a disgusting amount of art 

• Taking a nap

• Running, unfortunately (more on hating that later)

• Doing what I want to do, but in a spending money way

• Crying whenever I want for whatever reason, because I am not a stoic emotionless bitch smoking outside a club, I’m a cancer sun

• Scrolling on stan twitter like I’m not 28

So there you go! Brat can be whatever you want! For me it’s cozy and involves a lot of crying. For you it might be something different. I’ll be updating my brat-ish adventures on this blog, and for what it’s worth, if you’re reading this (gestures to the empty room that is my substack follower list) I hope you stick around to see it, and that you make your own brat summer list for yourself.