This blog is my musings on life and love. If you’ve read any of my books or stories on IG, then this is kinda what that’s like. Reading, relationships, revolution, and more.
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Another day 41
Tuesday 3/1/2022 Grading, idk Teaching really takes up so much time. Wednesday 3/2/2022 Margarita time Thursday 3/3/2022 Not beat Friday 3/4/2022 Dude was sitting in isolation for no reason for a month. Was on a hunger strike and everything. I called the prison yesterday to complain and they let him back in population today. Sad!…
Crop Tops in the Winter
Some days I’m about to throw on any old shirt. Then I think–yea but why would I want to look any old way? How simple it is to show a little cleavage or midriff? Especially when it’s something that will change my whole mood, my whole outlook on life. A cute top half is a…
Another day 40
Tuesday 2/1/2022 Paper drafts due later today. Bored now, swamped later. Sushi & the SHU library. Wednesday 2/2/2022 My students on day one writing about imprisonment: yea people should go to prison if they do something really badDay two: prison is wrong Me *handshake* radicalizing the youth 8-4 & 9-5 is the white man’s schedule….…
Not School is a grassroots literacy program designed to get people to read
Not School is my newest venture. I’m looking for funding and for people who’d be interested in joining once it’s up and running. Please also feel free to share this information with others. You can go to Not-School.com for more donation options and updates, but here is the general idea: This is a month long…
Another day 39
Saturday 1/1/2022 Ignore the hate ignore the fake ignore the funny shit -young ma What did I think Carrie? That he’d see how good I make cupcakes and realize he was in love with me? -Miranda, SATC (that’s my paraphrase idk the exact line just sitting here thinking about that scene) Playing connect 4 against…
Another day 38
Thursday 12/16/2021 Feelings *handshake* hurt My son will play cops and robbers but if he’s a cop he’ll join the robbers and says he’s just DRESSED UP like a cop lol. Can you tell he did half a master’s degree in the womb? Ya’ll know what orbiting is? It’s a good enough reason for me…
Tell me I’m the one
The last scene at the end of Sex and the City’s first season. Carrie is wearing a white off the shoulder top and red open-toed mules. She standing in front of her building telling Big to tell her she’s the one, and he’s just silent. God. I guess that’s the annoying thing about being single…
Another day 37
Wednesday 12/1/2021 Getting sushi and returning library books Thursday 12/2/2021 Reading two books right now. One is a really long novel by Dostoevsky. The other is a short poetry book in Spanish that I keep rereading pieces of trying to understand it more accurately. Not being obsessed with anyone is cool I guess. Scorpio is…
Another day 36
Sunday 10/31/2021 Books containing stereotypes invite children to participate in that way of thinking, but children do not have to accept that invitation… affective relations can be critically effective ones. -Philip Nel Monday 11/1/2021 idk Tuesday 11/2/2021 Nobody:Me, to a student I’m tutoring: T.S. Eliot is not god!!! I’m so aware, I’m so prepared, I’m…
Another day 35
Sunday 10/10/2021 Someone yesterday at the Westfield street fair left a review for Ten Dollar Books saying “sweet owner.” Period. Sold a bunch of books in Westfield yesterday. S/o the woman who bought both MLK books. Her and the guy in Newark who got the Malcolm X book, the Tupac book, and Live from Death…
Another day 34
Sunday 9/12/2021 Just finished Nightbitch. Some dudes try lol. Nevermind. Too sexy for this. Went to the library for the first time since corona. Got some great stuff. Was nice browsing in real life just for myself. Best section to look is the new books shelves. That’s what the library recently bought based on professor’s requests…
Another day 33
Sunday 8/29/2021 Reading Just Mercy. Pretty frustrating. That fourteen year old who gets sent to an adult prison….. smh. Talking to a person who also went to hair school is the fastest way to bond with someone lol. You know something about me. One dude yesterday said my son needs to take up karate or something…
Another day 32
Sunday 8/15/2021 Finished White Girl Problems “I like that you so quiet”Thanks it’s my personality. Monday 8/16/2021 Me censoring “fuck the other shit” to my son: fuck the other stuff Lol Tuesday 8/17/2021 Forever finding stuff to do with this kid. Gotta get back into teaching mode. Got a work meeting tomorrow already. Wednesday 8/18/2021…
Another day 31
Sunday 8/8/2021 Finished My Year of Rest and Relaxation. I really liked it. Fun book. Remembering your page number before you close a book is the bummiest bookmark around. All I do is work on stuff and entertain my kid and get my feelings hurt. Monday 8/9/2021 Reading a book by someone who had pancreatitis.…
Another day 30
Sunday 8/1/2021 Me: damn why am I so drowsy and cloudy today :/Period app: Your period is 0 days away Simone de Beauvoir gets it… She has a line like “he doesn’t give a fuck. I’m in bed with memories of ours and just dying to talk and I call and you don’t answer the…
4 the love of tube tops
by Rachel Wagner They are the perfect shirt. Instantly sexy and cute. It stands out because there’s such a thin layer between you and my chest. Can’t help but look. The bust is the one that’s holding it up. Shoulders aren’t responsible for anything. Collar bone is completely exposed. It’s like how you look with…
Another day 29
Sunday 7/18/2021 I be in the zone I do my own thing in my own head Let me get this straight……. Monday 7/19/2021 Migraine time Self-isolating to cope? Yea people do that it’s totally normal. Feeling effected by Flying Kites. Prison is so evil. Consider me. Tried watching the show Sex/Life show last night on…
Burning bad books
by Rachel Wagner If I see a book that’s racist or liberal or whatever just terrible somehow, I don’t give it away I destroy it. I don’t just not want it. I also don’t want you or anyone else to have it. I want it to not exist. When I had in my possession to…
Another day 28
Sunday 7/11/2021 Anyone who can pass the civil service examination today can kill me tomorrow. -George Jackson There have never been any spontaneous revolutions. There were all staged, manufactured, by people who went to the head of the masses and directed them. -George Jackson I’m not carrying this extra weight around my belt for nothing.…
Another day 27
Sunday 7/4/2021 Sold mad books today. Shout out Jersey City foreal. Monday 7/5/2021 This guy yesterday was like it’s really attractive that you’re selling books I mean you’re beautiful but that makes you even more attractive that you’re into books… lol “Okay what TIME I’m seeing you cuz I know you slick” lol. This dude…
Another day 26
Sunday 6/27/2021 Not amused People seized a McDonald’s store in France that was out of business and took it over as a food pantry location. And they use the drive-through as a walk-through to get bags of stuff. Love it. How Europe Underdeveloped Africa is sooo good. It’s changing my world. Monday 6/28/2021 Graded for…
Another day 25
Sunday 6/20/2021 Last night someone told me I was a great writer and to keep going. Then later when they were drunk he said me every guy wants me and to use that lol. True and true. That said I’m ready to jump off a cliff. Nobody:Me: *crying on the phone talking to my bd*…
Another day 24
Sunday 6/6/2021 Am I posting on IG because I’m spiraling or because I’m doing good… the world may never know… And their joy in each other was unparalleled. -Barbara Taylor Bradford, A Secret Love Affair She was falling in love with him. She shouldn’t, but she was, and she didn’t know how to stop herself.…
Another day 23
Sunday 5/30/2021 Today being Sunday is so random to me. Doing hair is so… familiar. Shout out instant gratification. Monday 5/31/2021 Just your average girl forced to live under a capitalist regime… Before you try to use me for sex consider this: don’t Tuesday 6/1/2021 When is school over? Old work popping up… regular… Being…
Ode to athleisure
by Rachel Wagner I never wore leggings growing up. I would never think to wear them as pants even tho that’s what a lot of the girls around me were doing. From a suburban public school system to working at a grocery store and then working at hair salons, it seemed like people wore leggings…
Another day 22
Sunday 5/23/2021 To be kissed… The law constructs illegality, while racism constructs the illegal. -Harsha Walia, Border and Rule US forces are operating in 70 percept of countries worldwide, and nearly eight hundred US military bases dot the world map. -Harsha Walia Since the fall of the Berlin Wall, severity walls now exist in our…
Palestine in Newark
by Rachel Wagner I was struck by this photograph of a scarecrow in Edward Said’s After the Last Sky. It’s made out of sticks, a piece of cloth, and a shoe, displayed alongside a wired fence. It’s described it as: “1979. Near a Bedouin encampment, a little kitchen garden—and it’s scarecrow.” I liked it I…
Another day 21
Sunday 5/16/2021 Terminé El Odio Que Das hoy. Watching a guy in the reflection of a window while he watches you walk away just to pass the time… Monday 5/17/2021 The more I hear, the more my insides go bananas. For days. I can’t stop crying screaming fainting listening recoiling retching agonizing, which no one…
Another day 20
Sunday 5/9/2021 Being a downer has its perks. I hate that scrolling is easier than reading a book. Physically and socially. Tho I do scroll less when I am reading a book that’s easy to pick up. A Little Life was like that. Felt like you could just start reading any moment. Monday 5/10/2021 Being…
Another day 19
Sunday 4/25/2021 Slept in this morning because it’s my last chance to do so this week. Then I read some El Odio Que Das. Feeling very awake and present but also kinda sad and lonely. Earlier today stepping outside my neighbor was like hey sexy. Then just walking inside a different dude was right there…
Another day 18
Sunday 4/18/2021 There’s a dude out here mad at me 4 smoking up his weed. Another mad at me 4 cutting him off 4 not having a car. Another mad I didn’t wanna talk 2 him cuz he has a girlfriend… lol bum behavior. Like I will walk right past ya stupid ass… do not…
Another day 17
Sunday 4/11/2021 I still listen to cds. I don’t stream anything. Like [il]legal downloading is really valid. Again… dudes who make the least amount of effort act the most shocked when ya’ll don’t link lol. This dude at a lil backyard party was drunk as hell walking past me making some noise at me. EW.…
Another day 16
Sunday 4/4/2021 It feels good as hell to be able to read a book in Spanish. Four months ago, I swear I didn’t know anything beyond middle school Spanish class. Been enjoying manga more lately too which is a style I haven’t been around since high school Japanese class… tho really I was also never…
Another day 15
Sunday 3/28/2021 Somebody spoke fear into my idea so now I have to do it just to spite them 
scorpio problems lol Life… Got a virtual poetry event to read at today. Guess I should pick which poems I’m going to read. Okay gonna do: Tale of 2 whitegirls The library hold To be…
Perfect teenage girls
by Rachel Wagner One of my neighbors has fake-beef with a teenage girl around here. She said something to him or his kids (or was it his friend’s kids?), and it turned into a whole big situation. Months later, he complains when he sees her around. I stopped him tho the other day being like,…
Another day 14
Sunday 3/21/2021 They ask 4 silver & gold, but I ask 4 love -Barrington Levy A veces la naturaleza me hace sentir mejor, más humana, como si estuviera conectada con todo y con todos. Otras, quiero acostarme bajo en árbol y disolverme en la tierra para siempre. -Erika Sánchez Being able to communicate in Spanish…
Another day 13
Sunday 3/14/2021 Dumbass day lights savings Woke up at 10am, cleaned, coffee, read, wrote, smoked, chilled. Feel like I didn’t do much today, but maybe I did. Monday 3/15/2021 Persevering out of spite & out of habit & out of cultural values Time is weird Saw a junkie walking around in a short sleeve mini…
Read or Die x Ten Dollar Books
Read or Die came first. I’ve been keeping this lil book blog about the books I’m reading since 2017. My first post was about The Prada Plan 5 by Ashley. Then in 2019, I put out my first book, titled Back Like I Never Left, and I was selling it at Military Park for $10.…
Sexlessness
by Rachel Wagner People assume when you’re single that you must be out having wild and crazy sex all the time or that you are actually just dating a lot of different people or damn how many boyfriends do you have or whatever. But really anyone who has been single a while like I have…
Shoe training and body modification
by Rachel Wagner The middle of the summer had already passed. I knew I was buying my last pair of sandals for the year. You could feel the cold looming in the air, tho it was still weeks away. Still, I couldn’t imagine going four more weeks with the same shoes from the past couple…
Another day 12
Sunday 3/7/2021 Started to read a new Spanish book this morning that’s like a regular adult book and it was too hard lol. Less than 20 pages in I was like ok let me go buy a YA book in Spanish real quick. Just read this manga called Komi Can’t Communicate. It was really cute.…
Forced to read my own books
by Rachel Wagner I remember the last time I was in a library. It was about a week before the world shut down foreal for corona. I was picking up a stack of books at the desk feeling like, okay let me hurry up and grab these while I can. Things were going bad. I…
Another day 11
Sunday 2/28/2021 If I’m honest, all my relationships have been like this, parsing the intent of the jaws that lock around my head. Like, is he kidding, or is he hungry? In other words, all of it, even the love, is a violence. -Raven Leilani Finished Luster this morning and talked on the phone with…
Another day 10
Sunday 2/21/2021 Just finished A Little Life Come outside & not 10 minutes go by before I’m leaning into somebody’s beamer & they’re asking for my number smh. Such is life. Otherwise feeling pensive. Mannie Fresh beats are such a joy!! They make the song worth listening to until the last sound. That’s talent. Monday…
Another day 9
Sunday 2/14/2021 Feared and hatred, fear and hatred: often, it seemed that those were the only two qualities he possessed. Fear of everyone else; hatred of himself. -Hanya Yanagihara, A Little Life What is going to happen to me? he asked the sea. What is happening to me? -Hanya Yanagihara I can walk it like…
Big ass books
There’s something dreamy about starting a big ass book. One that’s like 400 pages and up. And not a lil compact paperback. Like a real-sized book, four inches thick or better, even on thin paper. You can feel its construction in your hands. It’s structure seems different. You begin it accepting that you’re about to…
Fck trauma bonding
You know what I’ve been thinking about the past few days? How there’s a difference between careless behavior and cruel behavior. Both are hurtful, but part of the cruelty is often them pretending they’re just being careless. And you wonder: Have they been this cruel before? Will they go on to be cruel to others?…
Another day 8
Sunday 2/7/2021 I neither started the protest nor suggested it. I simply responded to the call of the people for a spokesman. -MLK, on the bus boycott Agape is disinterested love. It is a love in which the individual seeks not his own good, but the good of his neighbor (1 Cor. 10:24). Agape does…
Another day 7
1/31/2021 Wait… there’s people who aren’t sad everyday???? Bitches out here begging for a crumb of serotonin… I’m bitches… Ya’ll know I had to bless my bird friends with some pancakes and bread and French fries before the snow. This dude just stopped walking to be like “I hope you FEEL as good as you…
Another day 6
1/24/21 Repressed men love me 1/25/21 Semester hasn’t even started and there are 4 corona cases on campus for spring 2021 And they say I’m an essential worker… yea ok… 1/27/2021 Reading The World is Moving Around Me The earthquake attacked what was hard, solid, what could resist it. The concrete fell. The flowers survived.…
The thing about writing letters
I get a letter in the mail back from my son’s dad, and I immediately forget what I had written to him. He’s responding to stuff I’m sure I said, but I don’t quite remember my exact words. I wish I had my letter in front of me too, but they’re in prison with him.…
Re-learning Spanish
I haven’t taken a Spanish class since like middle school, but I was okay at it back then. I knew some words and got good grades and could communicate certain things. Still, I would have never tried to read a regular book in Spanish or opted to speak Spanish unprompted or written a few sentences…
Another day 5
1/20/21 My son made a black power poster today for school. It’s so good lol. He traced around his fist like you would do to the turkey hand for thanksgiving. Then he colored the whole thing in black marker. Nice. He loves Martin Luther King Jr. Imagine being satisfied with biden and kamala lol. Wrote…
Another day 4
1/19/2021 Existo en teroria. If you’ve read all my Instagram stories from the beginning (about a year ago), then you’ve read over 100 pages of mine lol. Finished transcribing them all onto a word doc the other day. Not sure what to do with that yet. One night I think two summers ago I didn’t…
Another day 3
1/18/2021 Even when I go to think in Spanish, I’m like, “él nunca me amó.” Oh yea I’m re-teaching myself Spanish right now. It’s cool. Good thing I went to grad school. I can’t afford that…… emotionally…. Quiero un novio que es un amigo, no un amigo que es un novio. Having to beg for…
Local birds love pancakes
I made pancakes after Christmas. Guess it was more like brunch. But that was the first time my son had even agreed to try them. He always liked waffles before that. Anyway yea now I turned him over to the pancake side. It was by telling him the truth, which was that they were actually…
In a state of longing
I’m reading a book right now that is making me miss college. It’s actually making me miss a version of college I never had. I never lived on campus never taught abroad never did any traveling of any sort. The whole time I worked two jobs and had two majors. I ran here and there…
I am my own muse
I once had a guy be like he couldn’t date me because I might write about it. Yea I guess, except that who said I was even giving you the chance to be written about lol. I never even said yes to a date. Okay? You read my book and now you think I just…
Healing is such a process lol
Every time I read a book I’m like, wow I really needed this, as if I’m not the one curating my reading list lol. Nah, but I do pick books based solely on what I feel like (the vibe is clear within the first few pages), and I always manage to find something relevant to…
Parting with my college space heater
I gave away my space heater from college yesterday. Honestly, the apartment I’m in now is the first place I’ve ever had that had even just decent heat. That space heater has been an important item in my life for years. I remember vividly sitting on the edge of my bed with that heater blasting…
8 MILE 18 years later
I watched the movie 8 Mile (2002) last night because I had just finished reading a book about him, White Noise: The Eminem Chronicles. I wanted to stay on topic a little longer lol. And I love him so ok put it on. I stayed up for the whole thing, unlike how I fall asleep…
Notes of a woman followed to her car in the dark
When I came home from being followed to my car in the dark after Halseyfest last year, I told my dude at the time what happened and he totally mixed me off. Not like I was crying or something, but I was mad being like, right?? Why would this man follow me and my son…
One random hour without my kid
When that car door closed with my kid inside and I walked away, I was so relieved to be alone that I almost didn’t want to hit up this guy who had been trying hard to see me. And he’s nice. Still when I got inside I was like yea I could just chill this…
Forgetting your book
My friend has a back porch that’s good for reading. It was built onto the house by her friend. The structure holds up a table and chairs nonetheless. Sitting back, you face the long rectangular backyard. We sat there and talked and I also sat there whenever I was alone. In the morning with her…
Another day 2
11/10/2020 my chemical romance is really out here changing lives lol i’ve had a few students write about them over the years honestly weed was already legal to the extent that i use it lol and student loan 4giveness–ya’ll wasn’t getting that shit back anyway lol again… people are gonna do what they’re gonna do…
Another day 1
11/9/2020 no happiness just vibes s/o anxiously attached people only… if you’re secure or avoidant, this is not for you!!! the Aquarius dude i met is mad wholesome this dude yesterday was like i knew one other whitegirl in my life & she tried to be hood but you just hood teaching kinda sucked today.…
To be fetishized
There was this whiteboy a few years back who was fake-surprised black guys liked me cuz I was skinny. I had to do a proverbial pat on the head like, every. body. want. a. taste. Same thing I end up telling all my dudes. It doesn’t matter gay straight white black whatever. Please do not…
Someone to like
After leaving my son’s dad, I had a feeling I’d never meet anyone. I’d dated around already for over ten years by that point. I was all set. Good. Done. Long short, near far. Been set up, beat up, drugged up, lied to, left behind, liked, loved. I know what goes on, and I had…
In a toxic relationship with my job
Sunday night has arrived. Tomorrow is back to school, back to work. I teach in the morning and tutor in the afternoon while my son does his class in the next room over. We both hover over our laptops and manage to get through each week day. I know we’re lucky to be home. I’m…
Self-soothing is 4 suckers lol
Honestly I’m sick of thinking of more things to do to distract me from being sad. Trying to replace that default setting with a redirected return to your own life hurts too. It doesn’t even feel right. You really have to consciously choose jogging over texting. Smoking instead of calling. Reading and going to sleep…
Driving across America
I recently drove from Newark, New Jersey to Indianapolis, Indiana. It was eleven hours of speeding down long stretches of highway. Stopped mostly only for gas and food and otherwise just kept going. I didn’t play much music, just some NPR. My son was on his lil tablet half the time so I just let…
The state of the SAT
I got a job tutoring the SAT last year a couple months before corona happened. I was one of the newest hires and only tutored once a week even before they went remote, so naturally I lost that position due to the pandemic lol. Not like I wanted to work there anyway. All you really…
Ya girl got anger issues
I’m reading this book about anger called The Dance of Anger, but I feel like today it made me angrier. Or was I angry already? Yea I think I was already making myself angry on the wake up, then I started reading about it and it got worse. It finally reached it’s peak after I…
I don’t believe in writer’s block
You only can’t write cuz you’re not writing. If you really run blank and don’t know what to write at any given moment, you can always journal. Wallah–now you’re writing. Even if all you write is god idk what to write. I’m sitting here in a hoodie and jeans. A thong a top no bra.…
Took the paywall off GIRLTALK
I realized that people not automatically linked to wordpress already had to go through hoops to log into Girltalk, so I took the paywall off everything. My real goal is to get content off IG because that’s not where I want to be with my stuff. But I also don’t want what I pivot to…
Getting over someone is easy all you gotta do is…
All you gotta do is convince yourself they don’t look that good act that good or fuck that good ✓✓✓. Boom, roasted. Okay. Playing (kinda). Really it just is what it is. And it basically is that list lol. You’re persuading your own self out of things. And hey certain situations just end up like…
Cardio is mad addictive
I regret going less hard for sports after my best friend moved in middle school. I should have gotten a hold of that but instead I just had my eyes on boys and jobs. I was good at soccer, good at track. When 8th grade track started, I was in the beginning line-up with the…
Anyone who says they want a sugar daddy never had one
If you’ve ever actually dated for money/housing/food/drugs, you know that it sucks. Even if you’ve only done it in some low level way (like hanging out with dudes just to get smoked out), it’s just a big ass game. You do a lil bit of what they want to get a tiny piece of what…
Lolita & R. Kelly & Me
The most clicked on thing ever on my website is something I wrote about a book titled Sex Me that was marketed as being written by a woman who was in a crazy, toxic romantic relationship with R. Kelly. That anonymous story is mad traumatic and speedy and was only available as a PDF. I read it…
“You should start a podcast or something”
People have been telling me here and there that I should start a podcast or a some kind of archive based on my IG stories. Maybe a flipbook of the posts or a show based on the topics I’ve covered already. What I write there is mostly me oversharing about my romantic escapades and work…
Rachel Wagner 