I wish everything made me feel as good as The Great British Bake Off.

Plus, some updates from a few quiet weeks.

Hi! There’s an election coming up. Are you registered to vote? Are you sure? Here is how to find out. The deadline to register is October 26 — that’s in just two weeks!

Psst: No audio version this week as it ended up being a longer-than-usual post.

---

So far, my October has been full of a lot of very nice, very small moments. Simple, reliably good things. Take the return of The Great British Bake Off on Friday nights, for example. To me, there is perhaps no other form of media that feels so entirely pure, so consistently pleasurable. Whereas, say, the Industry¹ theme song makes my body immediately enter intense fight or flight mode, a feeling I imagine must be similar to when you do ayahuasca and are nervously waiting for the effects to kick in (“I am terrified at how weird and bad this is going to make me feel but oh well, I’ve committed.”), then GBBO is whatever the opposite of that experience is. Just imagining a chocolate cake topped with raspberries makes me feel euphoric. Just thinking about colorful bunting makes me want to clap my hands in glee. If someone were to ask me the happy place, the single location on earth I imagine when I want to feel calm, I would probably say that tent (the one condition being that no one there is being forced to make baked Alaska on a scorching hot day — IYKYK).

The only negative effect I ever feel while watching the show it’s that I always underestimate just how intensely it will make me crave obscure cookies and cakes and breads. Every episode, I’m somehow surprised by this yet again, saying things to Jake like, “What do you mean we don’t have all the ingredients to make a Battenberg? Not even a Victoria sponge? This is absurd. We’re living like animals.”

In other words, the show is wonderful. It brings nothing but simple joy to my life, and I am comforted by it each and every week, even when I find the bakes quite challenging. I mean, a puppet theater-themed signature bake challenge? Really? These are just normal people, Paul and Pru! Let them live! But I digress.

What I’m trying to say, I think, is that I love Bake Off in a way that is both incredibly deep and uniquely simple². It is a safe space, a warm spot to land. It asks nothing of me. It is simple and unchanging and comfortable. It’s the kind of feeling I’m trying to prioritize in my life more often, if not within every single moment of every single day, then at least within my own brain, my own sense of compassion for myself. On paper, maybe that shouldn’t be so hard, but I’m finding it is. In a weird way, for me, it feels harder than ever.

I’ve always known how hard I can be on myself, but for a long time, I’ve combatted each moment of self-doubt or anxiety by picking up my phone. Each like and comment and message and video and endless, easy scroll was a moment of distraction, either a reminder that I was interesting or attractive or smart (even if I didn’t really think so myself) or a way to numb out completely. I didn’t give myself a single second to process why I was feeling bad or to learn how to comfort myself. I just picked up my phone again and again until the bad feeling went away.

I still pick up my phone now, but I am doing it less often thanks to some habit shifts I’ve talked about. I sit with bad feelings for longer, which is uncomfortable, but I also sink deeper into good feelings. I appreciate them more fully than I have in the past. Things like Bake Off or trying out a new recipe or making a cup of tea and watching a movie that I’ve been meaning to check out for weeks or going to the library feel brighter, bigger. They feel more important to me than they have in the past, maybe. And though I find myself working through self-doubt and insecurity in a way that I haven’t really done before, I also find myself delighted by these moments of the small things I love. Each one feels like this small spark of knowing that I found this thing that works for me, this little pocket of life that I love. It’s the difference between simply not feeling the bad thing and actually, fully feeling the good thing for once, maybe.

---

A week (or so) in the life, in photos.

I really loved reading how much you all seem to enjoy my first week in the life, in photos post, so I thought I would add a small version of that to this post, too.

• After driving past one trail head for almost 2 years, I finally decided to check it out a couple weeks ago. I’ve been back three or four times since. It’s close enough that I can drive over, walk for 40 minutes, and be back home within the hour. A tiny chunk of my day, really, but the fresh air and the solo time always feels wonderful. Admittedly, I am not used to being alone in the woods and I have imagined myself scaling trees to avoid a bear multiple times³, but I’m getting used to it. It has been nice to go and just enjoy the quiet, or use the Merlin app to see what birds are around.

• We ordered a window for my writing cottage (see photo for how we tried to visualize what it will look like) and I am so excited! We were hoping the entire renovation would be done by October, but it’s looking more like an EOY thing at this point. Either way, the hearth is almost complete (Jake has been building it with old bricks found around our property) and the wood burning stove will installed by the end of the month. I can’t wait!

• I rented this sweater “dress” from Nuuly and promptly kept it. I’ve been looking for a fisherman-style sweater with this type of thick neck band (there simply has to be a better way to say that, but alas…) for a long time, and this one checked all the boxes. It’s very Rory Gilmore, and I love it.

• Still powering through my writing journal, which has really become an everything journal. I just hit 15k words in my new manuscript yesterday, and though it’s starting to feel a bit sticky, I’m writing more consistently than I have in weeks, so that’s a win.

• After hitting a challenging spot in a chapter, I took a notebook to the nature trail I mentioned earlier and walked/talked/wrote through some plot stuff I couldn’t quite figure out. I don’t know who thought to put a single bench in the middle of the woods, but I salute you.

• October sunsets are something else here. Everything is golden, golden, golden. I stood on the porch yesterday and watched the sky and clouds shift until it got too cold, and then I went inside and made my favorite simple spaghetti pomodoro, complete with fresh basil. A small, perfect sliver of a day.

• The guest room is feeling really cozy lately, and I smile every time I walk past and the sun is streaming in the windows. One day, I will find the right curtains for the room, if it kills me. But for now, it’s really lovely, I think.

• Jake and I rented Speak No Evil last week, and I loved every second of it. I am a huge fan of James McAvoy as an actor, and I love a thriller. It’s technically categorized as horror, I think, and it is scary, but it had more of a thriller vibe to me than anything. It wasn’t perfect, but I highly suggest for a fun movie night!

• Aforementioned fresh basil. We grew a lot of small herbs and vegetables in pots this summer, but I haven’t been in a regular cooking routine for a long time, so I didn’t use them as much as I’d like. I’m excited to expand our little garden next summer, though!

• We went to a fun pumpkin painting night at a friend’s house, complete with a lot of delicious snacks. I discovered I am not great at pumpkin painting.

• I don’t want to talk about how much money we spent on pumpkins last weekend, but I do want to talk about how much happiness they bring me. Sometimes I take a longer route home so I can drive past them.

• In the past, our house had two more sets of stairs leading to the front porch. Eventually, we’re going to rebuild them. Now, imagine with me for a moment, if we had pumpkins and mums going up the entire way… excessive, yes, but these are the things I think about.

• I flew through You Know What You Did by KT Nguyen this week. Kept me guessing until the very end.

• Misty mornings in the backyard.

• Two words: Pumpkin. Mug.

• I am sad that our local farmer’s market is wrapping up for the season soon. One of my favorite things to do is buy a bunch of flowers from our local flower farm (also, conveniently, a neighbor!) and spend a Sunday morning arranging them into different vases for the house. These dahlias took my breath away.

• A friend who happens to be a professional chef had us over for dinner and I’ve never been more impressed. My own salt dish??? I mean… I was blown away. Also, officially convinced I need to eat more squash. I did just see this recipe which intrigued me…

• On Monday morning, I woke up craving oatmeal but didn’t have the ingredients, so Jake and I went to a local spot and sat outside while we worked and ate breakfast. I reviewed the latest episode of Bad on Paper and enjoyed the combination of warm sun and cool air.

• I love Hallmark fall-themed movies. This was Pumpkin Everything. It was good, but I’d suggest starting with Falling for Vermont instead which is similar but has an amnesia plotline, which always adds a little spice.

• Last Friday was a very good day full of very good news, so Jake and I celebrated with our favorite charcuterie, some beers, and (later) a bottle of champagne and a dance party at home.

This was a long one. If you made it to the end, thank you. Stay tuned for some new stuff from me on Substack in the coming weeks, and lots more of this kind of stuff, too. I appreciate you.

To end, I’ll leave you with this video/song. To me, there’s nothing that sounds more like fall than this. Enjoy it with a cup of coffee.

Thank you for being here.

Olivia

---

PS: One last thing before I go… you can order my first novel NOW! If you’ve already read and enjoyed, I would be honored if you would leave a kind review or rating on Goodreads or Amazon. It makes a world of difference. I appreciate your consideration, time, and support immensely.

A portion of October’s subscriber proceeds will go toward the American Red Cross, specifically its Hurricane Helene and Milton relief efforts.

1. I should note that I also love Industry, despite how much it stresses me out.

2. It’s possible that these two things are what everything goes back to for me, I guess…

3. Conclusion: I would die.