Amber Tamblyn - Listening in the Dark: Women Reclaiming the Power of Intuition

Praise for Listening in the Dark

A new classic in the old tradition of women finding ways to remind ourselves, and each other, we have always been this powerful. This anthology isnt just worth reading, its worth passing down to your own next generation, so they never forget what you learned inside.

Ashley C. Ford, New York Times bestselling author of
Somebodys Daughter

The stories in Listening in the Dark , ranging from lyrical to thought-provoking to laugh-out-loud funny, make a powerful case for trusting your gut. Intuition can save our livesand even more than that, this brilliant collection argues, it can make our lives rich, fulfilling, and wholly, beautifully our own.

Claire Comstock-Gay, author of Madame Clairevoyants Guide to the Stars

What it means to know yourself and listen to yourself feel like lifelong practices. Listening in the Dark creates space for readers to ask and answer their own questions about what it means to trust yourself.

Rainesford Stauffer, author of An Ordinary Age

This is a luminous collection of compelling and important stories. In a world that is increasingly dangerous to women and non-binary people, Listening in the Dark is a powerful reminder that sometimes intuition is our only protection.

Natalka Burian, author of A Womans Drink and cofounder of
The Freya Project

This gift of a book is for any womansuch as myselfwho needs to be reminded why their gut instinct is the most powerful resource they have.

Michele Filgate, author of What My Mother and I Dont Talk About

Weve been told to second-guess ourselves. To doubt what we know in our bodies, our bones. And here comes this book with its chorus of brilliant, badass writers and thinkers saying Enough . Theres enough brainpower in these pages to electrify whole cities. The answers are right there, pumping your own perfect heart.

Megan Stielstra, author of The Wrong Way to Save Your Life

Amber Tamblyn is an author actor, and director. Shes been nominated for an Emmy, Golden Globe and Independent Spirit Award for her work in television and films. She is the author of three books of poetry, including the critically acclaimed bestseller Dark Sparkler, and a novel, Any Man. She is also a contributing writer for the New York Times. She lives in New York.

https://www.amtam.com

Twitter: @ambertamblyn

Instagram: @amberrosetamblyn

Facebook: Amber Tamblyn

Listening in the Dark

Women Reclaiming the Power of Intuition

US Poet Laureate Ada Limn

Amy Poehler

America Ferrera

Congresswoman Ayanna Pressley

Jia Tolentino

Samantha Irby

Dr. Mindy Nettifee

Lidia Yuknavitch

Dr. Dara Kass

Bonnie Tamblyn

Meredith Talusan

Dr. Nicole Apelian

Huma Abedin

Emily Wells

Jessica Valenti

Amber Tamblyn

For the next generation of Knowers:
Ella, Graeme, Zora, Lucia, Mae, Xochi, Lennox, Nyla
and my Marlow.

And for Jack Hirschman.

Contents

Dr. Mindy Nettifee

Jessica Valenti

Dr. Nicole Apelian

Meredith Talusan

Dr. Dara Kass

United States Poet Laureate Ada Limn

Bonnie Tamblyn

Lidia Yuknavitch

Jia Tolentino

Amy Poehler

Congresswoman Ayanna Pressley

Samantha Irby

Huma Abedin

Emily Wells

America Ferrera and Amber Tamblyn

What is it like to be a woman listening in the dark?

Anne Carson

By Amber Tamblyn

In the dark, my arms reach toward the sky to hold on to someone who is already gone.

Asleep in my bed, the sudden jolt of my body prompted by a dream that left as quickly as it came awoke me before my alarm could. I found my arms outstretched, my fingers casting shadows in the moonlight like wind-spanked branches. Once oriented, I yanked my limbs back close to my chest, gasping, and held myself close. Moments later, my alarm buzzed. I turned it off and reached for my digital watch to check the time and prepare for an early day of work.

The watch has a comforting feature whereby different pictures can be programmed to appear at random each time you look at it. I had been in Toronto, Canada, far away from home for close to six months, so I set the watch with various photos of memories that would sustain me while I was away: my mother on the beach in Santa Monica holding on to her windblown hat, laughing. Our ailing, old dog licking our three-year-old daughter Marlows face. A trip with friends to a cabin in the woods. My husband drinking his favorite pint of beer at our favorite local bar. That one Beyonc concert. I loved not knowing which memory awaited me each time I looked at the watch, and each pictures reveal was a welcome surprise that made me feel closer to home.

The watch lit up the blackened room as I looked at its face, and the glow of a picture struck me so bright and so present, I winced: my writing mentor, the poet Jack Hirschman, standing in Caffe Trieste in San Francisco some years earlier, holding my then baby daughter in his arms. She is clutching on to his black shirt with her tiny fingers as his hand cups her diaper, holding her close. Jack is a brilliant writer and has authored more than a hundred books in ten languages as a celebrated poet the world over. In the picture, I can make out the wise rings of his skin, an ancient tree of a man. I can see the rubbed reddish-pink flesh between his thumb and index finger, the place where his pen has rested and written for more than seven decades. His ring finger pushes down against Marlows diaper, keeping her steady against his chest like a pianist holding a vital note to finish the chord. In the picture, Jack is wearing his signature red suspenders, and silver writing glasses sit on top of his head. His white hair billows down over the canyons of his neck like fog. Marlow is looking out, eyes wide open, and Jack is looking down at her, his massive mustache spread broad across his face from a smile breaching beneath it, the cracks around his eyes deepened with joy.

I held the watch there in the dark room and stared at the image of them together, unable to get out of bed just yet. My body wouldnt let me. Jack is my creative father, the man who published my first poem at the age of twelve, who taught me everything I know about the power of my emotions put to pen.

Hey, my husband said, finally stirring in bed next to me. You better get up and get going. Youre gonna be late.

In the car ride to work, I again looked at my watch to see what new photo might appear but saw the same picture of Jack and my daughter. And again, when I got to my trailer. And again, during our lunch break, and when I got home, and before bed, and the next day, and the day after that. The face of the watch was no longer rotating the different photos chosen for it but instead held just this one. I checked the watchs app on my phone and reset it. But it was still stuck on Jack. It was stuck on Jack for a long time. How sweet, I thought, the universe keeping him close to me while abroad.

But my body told a different story each time I looked at the photo. I would feel physical unease: a sensation in my lower abdomen that would transmute with persistence all over. I directed all my senses toward the ache and then my mind, too. I asked what it was trying to tell me. What came back was a picture at first, painted in a thousand directives: an urgency to move, to travel somewhere far away, yet still familiar. To go somewhere distantly needed. I checked the watch again. Still Jack.