Things I Thought About Comes Back..

With a vengeance! 2023 brings a new strategy, structure and ideas that I finally got around to shaping.

Happy Wednesday my friends. I hope the first 10 days of 2023 have been good to you and you have been able to stick to your new year resolutions after the first three days of implementation.
I have, which is good news given that it’s the first time in 31 years on Earth that I actually draft up a plan aside from writing down my wishes–12 of them, one for every month of the year–on a white piece of printer paper and then set them on fire after toasting with champagne and eating three spoonfuls¹ of lentils at midnight. 

Here’s a picture of me taking a video of fireworks after burning my wishes and gobbling lentils. I call this piece of art “Anything For A Good Picture”. Credits: Giulia Vancini

Like I wrote in my last newsletter of 2022, I took some time off from writing any personal material to think about where I wanted this editorial project to go.

When I first signed up for Substack at the end of 2021, I was very afraid of the implications. I thought I was going to fall out of love with the art of storytelling—the pressure of delivering good material on a schedule felt incommensurate. I was setting myself up for failure before I even started.
This is very bad thinking and I do not recommend it to anybody who has any kind of personal project² in the pipeline–the time is now.

Fortunately, I proved myself wrong very early into this editorial venture.
Committing to publishing an essay every Wednesday not only made me fall ever deeper in love with my craft, it pushed me to be a better writer.
It was like one of those love stories where the protagonist (in this case me) meets a guy/girl they sort of like but are afraid to commit to for various reasons. Maybe they are too good, too kind, too understanding.
Eventually, they decide to give it a try and they quickly realize their fear was absurd.
Their love grows fonder and their relationship stronger as they decide to show up over and over for the other person (in this case my newsletter).
Week after week, month after month, the protagonist finds out that the pressure was all in their head, their lover is worth nurturing and they should just enjoy the ride.
In the case of a rupture in the bond or an unexpected end to the relationship, then they will deal with it; but crying over spilled milk while the bottle is still sealed and intact on the shelf is useless. 

And so here I am, renewing my vows to Things I Thought About for another year and I am even bringing a spawn into the picture–we’ll talk about a bit further down.
As the big procrastinator³ that I am, of course I didn’t actually put my head down and ponder about what shape, structure and form I wanted for this new era of writing until the very last leg of my hiatus.
I spent my break with my family, learning how to be a good auntie and babysitting my little niece while simultaneously rewinding back to my adolescence, wearing old clothes, sifting through old photo albums and letting my mother take full charge of my sustenance.
It was a delightful holiday time. Still, I didn’t let the pampering get the best of me.
Yes, I delayed the strategic work but I began gathering material for what is going to be an important part of this newsletter for the next couple of years.
Those who know me personally know I have been talking about writing a book for quite some time.
This mythological book has, in fact, been sitting on the back-burner since I began taking my heritage and family history into serious consideration in 2018, after I returned from Dubai.
It all started with the impelling need to learn more about where I come from—to piece together the events that led to the unlikely meeting of my parents and eventually my birth. 

Initially–and to this day actually–this longing took shape in the form of a meticulous research on how football impacts people’s lives and society.
I thought understanding what football means for people worldwide would bring me closer to learning about my father’s journey from Mafia ridden Palermo to what he’s been able to achieve as a professional athlete and subsequently as a FIFA agent.
To an extent, it did.
However, as I dug deeper into the subject and connected it to my personal life history, I saw there was so much more to his life and psychology than just sport.
I had an epiphany. I woke up to the fact that I knew nothing about my father’s life besides the small anecdotes that I heard about in no particular order while growing up.

Unlike my mother, I knew little to nothing about the neighborhood where he grew up, the activities he did as a child or what made him choose football as a professional path. And for a long time, I rejected the idea that I needed to know.
Some parts were far too painful. But as cliché as it sounds, nothing good comes easy. 

So I decided to put my big girl pants on and dismantle the barrier I put up between me and my dad as a child.
I chose to let go of the resentment that his absence during the most crucial periods of my upbringing brewed in me as it was essential not only for the fruition of my book, but also to understand parts of myself, my looks and personality that are intrinsically intertwined with his background.
In December,I began interviewing and recording my father, starting from the very beginning: March 4th 1964, the day he was born.

To say the process has been cathartic and liberating would be an understatement, but I have yet to find the appropriate adjectives to frame it so I will stick to that for now; especially as I continue my research and interviews with him. 

Anyways, this tearjerker paragraph is to say that I chose to serialize what I would like to eventually turn into my father’s biography and this very Substack will be the hosting platform. 
However, in order to dedicate the attention necessary to the project and continue delivering quality content to your inboxes weekly, I took the decision to paywall this part of my newsletter.

Moving forward, Things I Thought About will look like this:

1. Things I Thought About: a newsletter that keeps me from rambling on social media – my weekly essay containing longform deliberations about the things that make me wonder will continue to be FREE but it will only be published 3 Wednesdays per month.

2. My Father’s Project: the documentation of my father’s extraordinary life – a monthly chapter of this project will replace my essay on the last Wednesday of every month and it will be behind a PAYWALL.

Now, many of you don’t know me or my dad personally and you are probably asking yourselves: why should I pay to read about this stranger’s life? What’s so special about it? And I don’t blame you.
But if you have been reading me or following me for a while, you know that I am very adamant about the quality and level of appeal of anything I publish.
Additionally, I am also extremely skeptical about most people and subjects. 
For this reason, I ask you to trust me when I say the life of Giuseppe Accardi–aka my father–is incredible.
Matter of fact, certain events are so unbelievable that they sound like they were made up for the sake of narration.
I think this story will eventually make for a great movie too; not because I am an exceptional writer, but because his life is riddled with turning points.
Whether you decide to support me in this journey or not, I promise you will continue receiving above average food for thought weekly, just 3 instead of 4 times. 

Thank you for reading, see you next week! 

Ps. Here’s an interview that will give you an insight on who my dad is. It’s in Italian but I think Apple does a good job with the translation too.

1. This is a tradition I inherited from my mother. Both the wishes part and the lentils. The latter are supposed to bring good luck and money. And who am I to break this ritual?

2. I actually wrote about this too a while back, and it was one of my most successful essays.

3. I wrote about this too 😝