Newsletter 001: The Journey North

2024 was a huge year. Not only did I move across the country from Georgia to Minnesota, but I also lost my job, turned 30, learned about the death of an old friend, went to Milestones in Tennessee, and worked on refocusing my career. I wrote a ton from around August through October 2024.

This broader era of life (from around July 2024 until present day) I've been calling The Journey North, and it's the title of the new zine. It is both a physical reference (moving from the South to the North) but also a nod to one of my first zines, South Pole. South Pole captures a very low point in my life, written while hospitalized at a quack psychiatric hospital in Savannah, Georgia. The Journey North, as an era and a zine, has been very much a time of immense transformation rooted in so much experience.

When I make zines the process usually takes one of two forms: The idea and most of the content started with the intention of becoming a zine, or I wrote and made art without the intent of making a zine. To put together a zine from disparate writings, art, and other artifacts is usually more difficult for me, but also ends up being super rewarding. The Journey North is definitely the latter. Lots of my zines are pretty evenly split with art versus writing, but this one is primarily writing!

The process so far...

• Gather every writing (over 70) that I did over August through October of 2024 in one place. All of the writing was either in a notebook or on my iPad in OneNote, so I typed them all up in Notion (which I use as my "digital second brain"). This took forever! Then I narrowed them down to about 33 writings.
• I'm such a visual thinker, so I usually jump into my desktop publishing app of choice (Adobe InDesign) pretty quick because, for me, it's the best method for planning and thinking through the story I want to tell.
• Formatting the typography for all this writing has been a beast. Trying to keep uniformity while making sure everything is readable and indentation (which I seem to use a ton of in my writing) doesn't blow everything up... well, it's been a headache.
• Most of the writing is now in and most of the formatting is done, and it's time to collect, edit, and add all the visuals!

Milestones is on a beautiful piece of land and I wrote this one day while I was at the creek. During my time at Milestones I was wrestling with the concepts of death, dying, and afterlife. A lot of this was prompted by friends suddenly passing and my own medical emergency that nearly took my life in 2022. Want a lil peek? Here's a poem/story from The Journey North. I hope you enjoy!

Sleepy vibes flow over and around my body
Like the water flows over and around the stones

Here is familiar
Vibes from Franklin
Flow west
To Cumberland Furnace

Kudzu from Atlanta
Crisp air sunrises from Savannah
Possibilities from Merritt Island
And
Creeks
Rocks
Trees
Vastness
Smells
Sounds
And comfort from Franklin once more

Quiet can be deafening
The weight of absence
Compared to the presence of a feather

Here at this creek
With life all around
The sun sets
Hidden from view
Behind trees
Maybe alive
Maybe dying
or dead

What does it mean
for death to be
“natural”

Is it the same as how a sunset marks an end
Necessary
For tomorrow
Today is required to die
For tomorrow to live or be born

Surely it’s not that simple

Much like how I’ve never lived in Franklin, North Carolina
I think I know death
But truly I don’t
And hopefully never will

Open tabs

Workshop for Independent Publishing (WIP) from Late Night Copies Press: Zines are usually characterized by their "independently published" nature. But it can be difficult to publish something yourself without various (and often expensive) tools. When I can afford it, I usually print through a printing service. But there's something special about self-printing, folding, and binding. WIP here in Minneapolis looks like such an amazing place where anyone can get access to the tools they need to go about self-publishing!

BOOX Palma 2 Pro: I use an Apple iPad Air with an amazing matte screen cover from AstroPad to sketch and take notes for art and design projects. I've been jonesing for an ePaper-esque device with a nice tactile writing experience that's smaller than my iPad and have had my eye on BOOX for a bit. This new small device is part tablet, part eReader, has a camera, some color support, and runs Android so you can add apps like Spotify and OneNote. I don't need it... I don't need it... I don't need it...

Minnesota Paid Leave: In Minnesota on Jan. 1, 2026 a brand new paid and protected leave of absence law goes into effect. I am so proud to live in this state and everything I've read about this upcoming law just makes me feel cared about by my elected officials in a way I haven't for most of my life.

Currently enjoying

I've been loving podcasts lately, especially during my work day. My favorite right now is The Moth. The stories are told by real people, typically at Moth events, and are always incredible plus there's no shortage of episodes. Catch me laughing my ass off one minute and crying the next all while sitting at my cubical lol

Another is The Verge's new podcast Version History. It's about older tech and gadgets and how they were amazing, so terrible, incredibly influential, and everything in between. I think most people would enjoy this podcast, tech interest and background not required!

The latest on the latest

Tales and tips from the zine fest table

Zine fests are my favorite thing to do! Here are four of my top tips for tabling based on five zine fests and so so many inspirations. Plus a sneak peak at a future zine fest addition

Hannah HQHannah A. Patellis

In my last blog post I mention business cards and how I just haven't figured out how to best use them at zine fests. Yo Low gave me (yet another) incredible tip to maybe try a friendship zine in lieu of a business card! Just a simple 8 panel zine (made with a single sheet of paper) that tells about me and has where you can find me! It's been so much fun to make.

That's all for now! I have some cool stuff coming up including my art process and artist manifesto, my new friendship zine, and a look at photos I'm taking on a floppy disk-powered Sony Mavica digital camera from the late 90s.

Love you! Mean it! 🥰