Michelle Tea has come a long way since her days as a poor young writer, penning drug-fueled memoirs and novels like Valencia and Rent Girl about her colorful life as a sex worker and queer artist in the ’90s-era Mission District. Now, she lives in a cozy house in the Outer Sunset, not so far geographically from the gritty streets where her DIY literary career ignited. But at 43, sober, newly married to her partner Dashiell and a mother to a three-month old boy named Atticus, Tea has grown up—on her own terms.
“Those things work and feel relevant for a period of time, but not forever,” Tea tells me about her marked transformation. “Which is great because then you get to live this whole other way.”
Tea, who appears Jan. 27 at Books Inc. in the Castro, writes about stumbling into healthy, responsible, and self-aware adulthood in How to Grow Up, her new memoir. In essays peppered with honesty and wit, Tea doles out life lessons on love, money, sex, aging, DIY careers, poverty, writing, spirituality, making babies, fashion, and moving from maggot-infested punk houses into her very own clean, well-lit apartment on her 40th birthday.
The transition from working-class wild child, who co-founded the hard-living feminist spoken-word troupe Sister Spit and snorted meth at endless parties, into a spiritual and sober adult may surprise those who’ve followed Tea from her early days. But it didn’t happen overnight. Things shifted slowly, once Tea extracted herself from a toxic eight-year relationship and committed to radical self-care.
“You can get away with not nurturing yourself when you’re in your twenties and existing on pure adrenaline, and everything’s a little bit new, but that shit gets old,” Tea says. “If you don’t take care of yourself, things will fall apart. Whether that’s your physical health, or your emotional health, there’s a time limit on things not being sustainable.”