What are Dreams of Chaos?
It's freeing to question the unspoken conventions that govern us. Speaking with others who are also pushing boundaries can be inspiring. And a whole lot less lonesome.
When I started to imagine what this Substack would look like, I knew I wanted it to be more than a newsletter. Don’t get me wrong, I love writing my weekly newsletter, but I kept getting this itchy feeling that there was something more to excavate. The idea for this section, which I’m calling Dreams of Chaos, came to me at a bunch of random moments when I couldn’t write it down — while driving, when I was in the shower, while trying to fall asleep. This is usually how my brain works, you see. It waits for the least convenient moment, and then the ideas float to the forefront of my consciousness where they can wave at me before disappearing again.
It’s a *great* system.
Eventually, though, I had the thought enough times for it to stick, and the thought was this: I should have a whole section dedicated to how other people are expanding the status quo.
The thing is, I talk to so many fascinating folks. As a reporter, it’s literally my job to call strangers and get them to talk to me about their lives and what they do. I once cold-called the police in Maui for a statement on my way to pick up my kid1. I’ve interviewed psychologists, biologists, authors, musicians, chefs, rabbis, fashion designers, and film-makers. Among others. What do these folks all have in common? They all have a unique perspective and are using it to change their circle of influence, however large or small.
People are endlessly interesting to me. When I ride the subway or walk down the street, I’m always wondering about the people I see. Where are they from? Where are they going? What music do they love? What makes them tick? Who are their people, chosen or otherwise. I have yet to meet a person without a story to tell.
Dreams of Chaos is a section of this dedicated to the folks who are dreaming, like I am, of a messier way of existing in the world.
I, myself, have never been super great with authority and rules. They make me feel cramped and uncomfortable. It's freeing to question the unspoken conventions that govern us. Speaking with others who are also pushing boundaries can be inspiring. And a whole lot less lonesome. Thus, we have Dreams of Chaos: A bi-weekly series of interviews with someone who is expanding the ways of the world.
If you like what you’re reading, please consider becoming a paid subscriber. It’s just $5/month or $55 for the year. You’ll get 24 of these interviews during that year, plus reported essays and access to group chats about all kinds of fun, weird things!
In the meantime, here are some of my favorite recent(ish) conversations with creatives, to get those dreamy ideas flowing.
Back in 2020, I spoke with Chef Liz Alpern for Hey Alma about founding Queer Soup Night, creating community, and supporting LGBTQIA+ organizations. Here’s a fave quote from the piece:
“I really care about [Jewish] culture and I think it has good things that should continue to exist in the world and so we have to keep eating together. And I think with the queer community, it’s the same thing. I really care about the queer community so much. I mean, soup is a food that’s humble, it’s multicultural, it celebrates our diversity within the pot. There’s so many different elements within the pot, and I love that.”
For Lilith Magazine, I spoke with Chaya Milchtein (aka the Mechanic Shop Femme) about cars, inclusivity, and empowering women and queer folks to hold their own in the automotive industry. Here’s a fave quote from the piece:
“Because of the way that the industry holds itself, folks who are not men (and actually a lot of men, too) walk in and immediately feel insecure. Part of what my classes are about is explaining to people that, despite not knowing about cars, they have to trust themselves. You’ve spent your whole life dealing with people; you’ve developed a sense of when somebody is telling you the truth and when somebody is lying. The only way you can find somebody to trust is if you offer them the opportunity to earn your trust. It’s also a general life lesson — it’s not just cars.”
Also in 2020, I spoke with Laynie Soloman for TC Jewfolk about their work at SVARA: A Traditionally Radical Yeshiva and the inherent queerness of studying Jewish texts. Here’s a fave section from that piece:
Soloman, Rabbi Lappe, and many other SVARA-niks began asking themselves what it would look like to teach in this way. “We started to gather thoughts, dream dreams, about what it would look like to train teachers,” they said, “How do we recreate this soup?”
You may be wondering what’s so special about this soup, and the truth is that it’s not a secret spice blend or a few magic ingredients. It’s more like a rethinking of what it means to be soup, or what it originally meant to be soup. Originally, they believe, the rabbis of the Talmud were engrossed in the process of challenging and rethinking text. To them, studying didn’t mean learning verses of Torah by rote; studying was about being actively engaged with how the text could be understood in their time. Who’s to say that we can’t think about studying in this exact way, in our time?
Lastly, I recently had the pleasure of speaking with Daniela Mack, the incredible mezzo-soprano, who plays the part of Federico García Lorca in a queer flamenco opera by Osvaldo Golijov. Here’s a favorite passage from that one:
“There’s a certain freedom in the interpretation,” says Mack. “Here’s this man who, according to what I’ve read, had a softness to him. And there’s this sort of ambiguity, this element of the androgynous about him in this iteration. It’s freeing for me to not have to think so much about presenting ‘masculine.’ It’s just about finding the kernel of who the human was and what he stood for. It’s about identifying what about him as a human I identify with. It’s a beautiful experience, discovering this character.”
I hope some (or all!) of these conversations serve as an inspiration to shake things up a little. And if you’d like more of these, go ahead and hit that button to subscribe for more.
Spoiler: they were not super helpful.