Interviewed by Judy Thorn
June 11, 2026

I sat down with Megan Alves over fizzy white wine and matcha snickerdoodles that tasted like fish food for an exclusive glimpse at her process. This interview was cut down from a 24-minute conversation on her couch. Her breathtakingly small chihuahua licked me on the mouth repeatedly, but I didn’t mind.

The amount of writing that passes through your body every day is astonishing. Do you ever wake up feeling swollen with language? How do you decompress?

I really like “swollen with language.” That’s awesome. I think it’s funny you say that, because sometimes I do. I have these bouts sometimes. I’ll wake up, and I’ll make coffee, and I’ll try not to look at my phone. Not just trying to sound good for the interview, but I really try not to look. Sometimes I’ll do the dishes or something, kill some time and just let my brain wake up before phone. But phone calls to me so severely, and I just get back in bed with phone and drink coffee, and I will send out a flurry of Tweets before noon that’s just every passing thought that I have.

It’s really like writing time. I’m very grateful that you’ve encouraged me to take my role as a writer as something I’m even doing. I don’t know why it’s hard for me to think of it that way. I do feel like I wake up swollen with thoughts to share and to post. I’m actually doing morning words, or whatever. Morning pages. I’m microblogging, which is a term I used with you the other night, which was something I discovered when I read an article about the beginnings of Twitter, which I found really … honestly moving to my personal practice of morning posts. My favorite people who use X-formerly-Twitter use it as microblogging. I want to hear little things that happen throughout your life and day in a way that’s beautiful. I feel like that’s definitely my style of posting, and some of my other favorite friends from that website.

But I was laughing because you’ve kind of taught me to take that a little more seriously as I make my posts. Sometimes it exits my mind, and I’ve Tweeted something like, “I like getting boba from a place called Bobadochi.” And that was the whole Tweet, just “I like getting boba from a place called Bobadochi.” And I thought, I’m a writer. I’m a fucking writer. 

I find that your storytelling strikes a chord between authenticity and irony that is extremely satisfying. Are there any artists who have influenced your tone?

This one’s hard for me. I feel like I really struggle with recalling information. Maybe it’s just because I’m a Leo Sun, Libra Rising, Sagittarius Moon, but my personality flows out of me in a way I can’t control. If anything, I’m posting in such a fugue state that the inspiration forms in my head, and then I type it out, and then I hit send. There have to be people who have influenced me, but I don’t know.

Is there any exhibitionism to it?

You’d really think there was. I kind of have this problem where I don’t think about the consequence of anything as I’m doing it. If anything, as I’ve gotten older I’ve learned to hold my tongue, or hold my thumbs, if you will, before sending off those posts. Especially as I’m entering a romantic situation with someone, or there are personal things happening in my life; in the past, I’ve shared extremely personal things online that people love, of course, but then it hurts someone close to me, or it’s just off-putting to have someone live-Tweeting their life. I’ve definitely had guys be off-put by it. It’s not intentional exhibitionism. I’m just putting it all out there.

The person that’s coming to mind—and I don’t even think she influences me specifically, but I think she might have a similar authenticity-to-irony factor—is Jenny Slate. I really liked her comedy special where she incorporates her parents, and it gives you a roundabout picture of how she interacts with her family and how they’ve shaped her. Her tone is really sharp and quick-witted but also silly in a way that I enjoy. When I’m writing out a post, it should be poignant and also have this curve of humor or an unexpected adjective. What I aim for in a post is a satisfying string of words that mean something. A post is a satisfying string of words that mean something.

I mostly like pairings of words that mean something, but nothing really relevant. I recently drafted the two words “dirty sequins.” I like when they’re really dirty and the story that tells of a girl getting dirty in her dress. Dirty sequins. Refreshing flower. Squishy cookies.

People often come to you with questions about interior design. What advice do you have for someone who can’t seem to find harmony in their living space?

That’s a good one. Let’s imagine you have a space and you want to change everything about it, I guess. I would say identify your favorite thing in the room and design around that. If you really like this lamp, and you want it to stay, you can define what this lamp is. We’re looking at my ceramic 1960s seashell lamp. What is that shape? Not just a seashell. It’s a spiraled shell. This one is kind of hard to define. My place is very eclectic.

My friend is moving into a new apartment, and they scored this really awesome Scandinavian teak dining table for their little kitchen nook. We went shopping, and they got this textile that’s kind of woven, and older, and it’s beige and it’s got these lime green lines throughout it. They hung it above the dining table, and they sent me a photo after our day of shopping. I said great, this looks awesome. You have this Scandinavian folk thing happening in the kitchen. My point is, identifying an object and giving it some key words to help you identify other objects to pair with it is a really helpful base. So I told my friend, you’ve got this Scandinavian folk thing going on. Maybe add some modern elements. Every time you find an item you’re thinking about putting in your kitchen, ask yourself, is it Scandinavian, or is it folky, or is it both, or is it a modern touch? It gives you these base words to start building out a vision. It’s been a helpful brain map for me in developing a space, to give it these key words and definitions. I’ve helped friends with spaces before and they get lost in the sauce. Well, return to your ingredients.

Girl to girl, what is the tea?

The tea is I’m sorry and I think I fucked everything up.

Some say Portland will never return to its hipster heyday. What’s so special about this city?

This is gonna be very Californian, but Oregon feels so seasonal to me. I’ve really evolved to live seasonally. We all get nice and cozy in the winter, and I feel like summer is this manic burst of plans and fun and this summer spirit everyone breaks into. Portland is very fourth wave. We’ve really cut out corporations from our world, outside the big design industries we have here. I feel like people are really down to live locally. Even in the industry I work in, which is vintage curation and vintage resale. That kind of market is celebrated here. Secondhand and shopping local is so built into Portland’s world. I find that really special and really important in moving away from capitalism, or at least trying to live within a local ecosphere. I think that’s really alive here and something that’s making me really double down on Portland. 

There are a lot of cool things happening. Portland takes art seriously. From the first time I ever visited, I was like, Portland kind of never left 2010. I remember staying in the hostel, and I heard that Matt & Kim song “Daylight” over and over. This was in 2019 or something, a time when it was like, this really should not be playing right now, not even in a nostalgic way. Portland never left its twee hipster nature. We are a step away from mustache tattoo on the finger. I would lowkey get that tomorrow. We’re down to be quirky, and I think that’s important and fun. I’m turning 30 this summer, and I find this liveliness with fashion to be so encouraging of youth. It makes me remember that I can be cool and fashionable forever.

What does it feel like now that your Saturn has returned?

It feels like I’m having anxiety in a whole new way, and I’m having to regulate in a whole new way. I take my life a lot more seriously than I ever have, and therefore becoming unregulated feels a lot more serious, whereas I used to be able to messy bun, gangster rap, and handle it. I’m really having to tie that bun a little tighter, I’m gonna have to play that gangster rap a little louder, and I’m really gonna have to buckle down and handle it. I’m having reflections. I was actually journaling the other day about what my life felt like going into 30, and I was having these thoughts. When I read my old journals, I’m like, yeah you’re 22, no shit you felt like that. Obviously. I was writing some stuff that I was like, nnyeah. You’re 29 turning 30, like nnyeah. Like, we get it. I really wish you could get the tone of the nnyeah. I was writing that, and I was like, someday I’m gonna be 39 turning 40. Those things are settling in a little deeper. Yeah, I’ve really got three decades under my belt, and counting. I’m excited for my long life.