The longest day of the year, and, thank god, soon we’ll be making more night. The weather has been vivid lately. A heat dome has settled over the Middle West, the moon was extra bright last night, and I saw a rainbow in the parking lot yesterday.

A headline in The New York Times says “America is Heading Off a Cliff,” which is pretty evergreen. Last week a computer programmer claimed a chatbot achieved consciousness. Either Google is abusing sentient chatbots, or one of their chatbots drove a man insane. I’m not sure which scenario is more frightening. This morning I flipped on the local news, and they were interviewing “the first non-celebrity family” to ride a new waterslide. All of this feels like weather, too.

Tonight I’m trying to figure out what to do with this journal. I don’t want to write about current events or, god forbid, issues. There are far too many faith dealers, soothsayers, and thought leaders. The last thing this world needs is another opinion. Certainly not mine. On the other hand, writing about my life feels increasingly recursive, more and more like a dead end. Probably because I’m doing my best to live a boring life of routine.

I’m increasingly interested in digging deeper into fiction, particularly as the 21st century grows more science-fictional by the minute. I’d like to rewire this station into a space for experiments and exercises, for writing weirder and trying on points of view I don’t necessarily believe. So this journal will become a halfway house for homeless paragraphs, remixed and upcycled snippets from the past, and a few bloopers from the novel I’m writing. I’m going to call this series Interstate Scenes, and if I reach a decent number, maybe I’ll shape them into a little book. Hopefully, this feed will get a little strange. But I promise, I’m okay.