HeyJaredJacaranda
Personal essays about the connection between past and present, making sense of family history in order to know myself and forgive them.
- Indexed issues, last 90 days
- 5
- Latest publication
- Sep 27, 2026
- Audience
- Checking…
- Earliest in this view
- Jul 17, 2026
Latest issues
The Root of the Matter: Untangling hair, aging, and my mother’s ghost (opens the original)
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Far From the Tree is a letter to anyone who ever wondered if the stork left them with the wrong family. If today’s essay spurs something in you—a knowing smile, a moment of insight—I’d be honored if you shared it on social media or right here on Substack in the form of a restack.<a class="button primary" href="https://martinarwilliams.substack.com/p/the-root-of-the-matter-untangling?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email&utm_content=shar
Why I fell for the Rolling Stones (opens the original)
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The Rolling Stones animated joy in a way no one I knew did back in 1989. My boyfriend and I went to their Steel Wheels show in Toronto on a night in early September at the CNE Grandstand, next to the lake, the skyline beckoning in the distance. Pyrotechnics silenced the crowd. Then a familiar strumming of chords announced the tune, and Mick popped into view, strutting and singing, “If you start me up I’ll never stop,” green satin tails flying behind him. And I was hooked.<a class="image-link ima
The Pedal Car Caper and After (opens the original)
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Memory is a strange thing—unreliable, requires fact-checking, and yet the thing that makes us who we are. What we remember tips our identities, tells us something about the kind of person we are and how we arrived at this juncture in our lives. Probing memories can feel dangerous; danger exists in the possibility of misinterpretations and, therefore, inaccurate beliefs about ourselves and others; worse, we might get it right.Memories that peck at us in unexpected moments—washing the car, pouring
The Jackal in the Corner Office (opens the original)
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Have you ever wanted to delete your boss? Like, get rid of that person forever because you’re certain the world would benefit? If you could bump ‘em off without getting caught, would you do it?Maybe you’ve fantasized about shoving the bastard in front of a speeding subway train? Or thought to book the beast on a surfing holiday off the coast of Australia where there are no shark nets? Perhaps you’ve considered bludgeoning old ferret-face with a golf club at the Midnight Sun Charity tournament in
Bread, Loneliness and Philip Seymour Hoffman (opens the original)
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Hey, fam!I’m away in Greece and Turkey for all of July. Today I’m in Athens and have a stable enough Wi-Fi connection to post a letter to y’all.Below is an essay from a couple of years ago that still holds up for me. I hope it speaks to you. Like so many of you, I went through a mad bread-baking phase in which I produced sourdough loaves at least once a week. This lasted well into last year.</span
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