I started this Substack as a way to archive memories from my old handwritten journals and photo albums through storytelling. While I don’t want to venture too far from that theme, tonight I’ve been thinking about the archives of another writer whose words I connected with in a visceral way that still resonates months and years later. She was the kind of writer I want to be — a writer who helps others feel less alone in this world.
Like me, she was an obscure blogger who wrote about outdoor pursuits, plastering her entries with lovely photos and frequent diversions into philosophy. I was always thrilled to see a new post pop up in my feed reader. We seemed to share many of the same perspectives, so much so that I was surprised when I learned she was 10 years my junior — I supposed I just assumed that anyone still blogging in the 2020s must be over 40. But I was glad she made the effort. Even though we never met or even interacted in the virtual world, I appreciated the light she shined into the darkness.
Last July, an acquaintance who was a personal friend of hers posted on Facebook that she died tragically in a car accident. The news shook me to the core. Since we’d never met, it felt out of place and appropriative to feel such grief — but the grief was there, all the same. Four months later, I still think about her frequently. She deserves to be remembered, to have her archives live on.
“What I write is mine,” she wrote in an August 2020 entry. “My legacy of lived experience is my baby — quite likely the only one I'll ever have. Cultivating a consistent allegiance to record keeping is the only way I know to honor the memories and experiences of my time here on Earth.
I see my words as tombstones in the graveyard of time. Moments lived and disorderly thoughts wrangled. Feelings — real but fleeting, fraught with unpredictability, recorded for reflection and remembrance.”
I know very little about Juliet Maurer. She was likely a private person who didn’t share a lot about herself online. Her blog, “More Life, Less Waste,” is nonetheless an introspective confessional about the beautiful and often messy pursuit of a meaningful life. In her final post, she announced that she had completed a grueling investment in her future self by buckling down for nine months to earn her project management certification.
“With this one successfully realized and summer on the horizon, I now navigate back to my preoccupation with enjoyment,” she joyfully proclaims. “I’m looking forward to a trip to Bend in a few weeks, and so much more hiking and camping than my life has allowed these past few seasons.”
On June 28, a woman from Washington state was driving a silver Subaru Forester along a highway near Bend, Oregon, when her vehicle left the road, striking a power pole and overturning. The solo driver was ejected from the vehicle and sustained critical injuries. She was taken to Bend hospital and died 10 days later. She was 34 years old.
I don’t know for sure that this driver was Juliet — I found the news report online — but the details line up so I can only assume that this is what happened. It’s impossible to know why she missed the curve in the highway — perhaps she was startled by something. Perhaps it was just an instant of inattention. An instant is all it takes. It’s a sobering reminder of the fragile barrier we are all pressed against, and how quickly we transition from flickers of light to shadows in the long night.
“Very little in life is unconditional, and I wrestle with impermanence a great deal. Hence, I find so much pleasure and power in the idea that we can go out into the world and live a little, and something or even someone will still be there, absolutely unwavering in the meaning or emotion they evoke. Some things — not many, but some — are irrevocably etched into the stone of our being.” — March 2022
I learned of Juliet’s death the day before Beat and I left for a five-week trip to Europe. Although there are many aspects of Switzerland that I love, I always tend to feel more isolated when I’m there. During quieter moments, I went back and read most of Juliet’s blog posts, dating back to 2017. She became my virtual confidant all over again, guiding me through the bewilderment of the early pandemic, taking me on beautiful hikes in Washington and Arizona, and sharing my middle-aged sentiment that I used to feel confident in who I was and what it meant to me to live a meaningful life, but now I realize that life’s impermanence means I’ll never escape change, that even my most cherished hopes and dreams will flicker and fade, that there will always be more distant horizons. And then I remembered, oh yes, Julia was in her early 30s. I wish I had been so wise in my early 30s. I wish she could carry this wisdom into her 40s, her 50s. And then I’d start to cry.
“So much of life feels like this at its core: inexplicably grasping for something you can't quite define but that you're sure you will know when you find it …”
Pining for the past is the clearest indication that things are awry in my heart. Yearning for what was, former relationships and intimacies once real but long gone, is an unmistakable sign that I'm caught up in my karmic loop of samsara. That ever-turning wheel of aimless repetition and habituation can hold you hostage for a lifetime if you let it.” — August 2020
October 2022 has been a strange month for me. I can feel my most cherished passion of the past two decades slipping through my fingers. Probably not forever, but it’s been jarring to realize how little interest I can muster in adventure or even spending time outdoors. I’ve still boosted myself into activities out of sheer habit, but I fear even that momentum may fade. And then what would I be? I don’t even know. I’m too far into life to start with a blank slate, but I also have too much life ahead of me to slip into a bland routine.
“Why do my days feel cavernously hollow if I don't have a drink after work, eat something particularly delicious, DO something, achieve, check things off my list? The gaping need to be stimulated and to feel pleasure/highs every damn day is driving me mad. This fever for more creates a recurring sense of lack and an immense distance between my spirit and my life.” — October 2021
“Do things really have to fall apart to fall together, as Pema famously wrote? How close to a rock-bottom of total confusion do we have to hit before clarity and inspiration comes bounding in? It seems harder than ever to plan for the future in a world so overrun by extremism. Things feel less promised, certainly less secure. — June 2020.
Feeling too steeped in generalized anxiety to plan a more complicated activity, I climbed onto my bike trainer two days in a row this weekend. I didn’t venture outside once, and again felt bewildered by my lack of motivation. I had time for an adventure in the mountains this weekend. Sure, it was windy, but this typical autumn weather would not have killed me. Or perhaps it would have. Nothing in life is guaranteed — nothing but uncertainty. Because uncertainty is unyielding it will entrap us if we allow it. I was allowing it to entrap me.
“Liminality, though uncomfortable to the point of painful, is charged with intensity. Pushing our way out of a rut or leaping from a safety net invites opportunities for future synchronicity and unknown blessings. We stand on the threshold of the next great adventure, the next great discovery. Perhaps the next loss or failure, but certainly not stagnation.” — December 2021
I descended into self-flagellation, which brought me back to a memory of something Juliet wrote about “years spent grasping too tightly to an unyielding idea of freedom may end up stranding me on an island of my own making” … which is what brought me back to her blog today. It was cathartic to spend time with her words, even if the answers to life’s existential questions still elude us both (and wherever you are, Juliet, if even it’s a particle of energy in an infinite universe, I hope the search goes on.) I’m still grateful for the light she shined briefly in this darkness. So I wanted to share it here.
“Nothing needs to be wrapped up in a bow. That's really the crux of it, what I find so appealing. The moment in time is what's important. Not a journey, an arc, or even an ending.” — May 2022
Hi Jill,
Juliet’s dad shared your post with me. She was one of my best friends, a philosopher, a Scorpio, my sister. It fills me with joy that her blog impacted you in such a deep way. She was so wise and taught me so much. I will miss her lessons.
Much love,
Jasmine
I am both touched and in a way saddened that you, like me and all of those that knew and loved Juliet, are still affected by her passing. This piece is a treasure of remembrance, as well as an opportunity to take a hard look at our own lives. Thank you for applying your deft pen to cyber parchment and introducing Juliets wisdom, and your keen reflections on life and untimely deaths.
Box Canyon Mark