SPARK Magazine Issue No. 15: Amuse-Bouche

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ISSUE NO. 15

DECEMBER 2020

issue no. 15 intentional snippets of musings; a playful twist on reality to excite and invigorate the senses

SPARK

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maya halabi editor-in-chief design director adriana torres layout director jennifer jimenez assistant layout director juleanna culilap assistant layout director xandria hernandez digital director lily wickstrom creative director nikita kalyana associate creative director sarah stiles assistant creative director caleb zhang director of hair and makeup anna strother assistant director of hair and makeup amber bray assistant director of hair and makeup jane lee modeling director maggie deaver assistant modeling director rodrigo colunga pastrana assistant modeling director diana perez photography director paige miller assistant photography director alyssa olvera director of styling alex cao assistant director of styling zaha khawaja assistant director of styling sage walker senior print editor laura nguyen associate print editor divina ceniceros dominguez associate print editor maya fawaz assistant print editor kelly wei senior web editor ty marsh associate web editor patricia valederrama assistant web editor eunice bao social media editor farah merchant business director haneen haque finance director melanie che co-director of events meghan mollicone co-director of events kendall casinger marketing director malaika jhaveri assistant marketing director christina lowe

staff grace alexander, rachel aquino, ellianna arreola, jeremiah baldwin, katya bandouil, nick barnes, lindsay bartol, marie bennett, swetha berana, tara bhikha, chloe bogen, brooke borglum, chiara boye, ana brown, nic buonincontri, abby burgy, kyra burke, roman calderon, luis camarena kuchle, noelle campos, lily cartagena, shreya chari, zimei chen, hayle chen, claire clements, michelle collins, hannah coursey, kelsey crawford, marley crawford, yasmine daghestani, esther dashevsky, grace davila, jesus del real, daniela del toro, jessi delfino, shreejwal dhakal, bette diehl, kiera dixon, tony dorantes, erin dorney, amaan dosani, olivia du, gabrielle duhon, clara elenes, montserrat elias, madi esmailbeigi, kendal faucett, gigi feingold, madee feltner, mckenzie fisher, darnell forbes, meg foster, lindsay gallagher, jayashree ganesan, david garcia, adrianne garza, aleigh gerron, gracie gilchriest, kalee sue gore, kaden green, erica grifaldo, kristen guillen, nathan han, michael hernandez, ella hernandez, iza hilmi, julia holstein, kat huang, noor iqbal, rusama islam, jaycee jamison, lily jaques, yeonsoo jung, zuena karim, sruthi keerthipati, ifeoluwa kehinde, cam kelly, kelly kim, eunjae kim, callie kurpiewski, carmen larkin, katie lichter, alyssa lin, jane liu, abby lodge, danny lopez, christina lowe, shianne lum, vincent luu, mia macallister, kaitlyn marcatante, ulises martinez, alec martinez, ricky martinez, teresa martinez, marnie matthews, andrea mauri, emilea mccutchan, mikaela medina, beth mikeska, basil montemayor, zion mpeye, gillian navarro, maya nguyen, thao nguyen, izzy nuzzo, kim pagtama, katie pangborn, samantha paradiso, ingris pereira, eliza pillsbury, ryan ragin, shreya rajhans, veronica rasmussen, lane rice, danae rivers, marissa rodriguez, clarissa r. abrego, wendy rossi, nicole rudakova, leslye ruiz, nathen sabapathy, jillian schwartz, elyssa sefiane, madison shaffer, megan shen, kent shinnick, maddie siedell, presley simmons, anoushka singhania, maddie sintes, garrett smith, parker staveley, leni steinhardt, nina su, pranav subramanian, tiffany sun, erika takovich, katherine tang, joseane tejada, kristy thai, sara tin-u, ethan tran, jacob tran, lauren tran, alexandra trujillo, carmela urdaneta, rebekah verghese, miranda vilchis, nani villalvazo, shania wagner, erin walts, izellah wang, susanna wang, shini wang, eileen wang, amber weir, sophia werkenthin, brionna williams, cat wilson, ian wood, campbell woods, sophie wysocki, karen xie, erica xu, karen yang, jessie yin, shuer zhuo, caden zips

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uncertainties circling in the air. I felt a newfound sense of purpose — as if the mundaneness of everyday life would suddenly be whisked away with my head buried into my new role. While I felt a sense of purpose, I realized that burnout in the midst of a pandemic wouldn’t propel me to serve Spark as prime as I could. From past experiences, I discovered that staying busy to ignore the realities of my inner world and feelings only allowed me temporary satisfaction. Instead, I chose to be mindful; In order to gain the tools I needed to reach my ideal self in an uncertain world, I started going to therapy. I fueled my creativity by learning guitar and finding inspiration in vintage furniture. I learned over and over again the importance of self-compassion in the times where I wasn’t overflowing with creative juices or wasn’t motivated to finish a marathon of tasks.

from the editor

As much as I want to say we finally came out kicking and screaming, we’re all still scrapping our way to the other side. The atrocities of coronavirus still linger among us, far longer than we expected them to eight months later. In late May, an incoming revolution and a push for social change were sparked by the racism embedded into our country’s institutions. In light of this, we’re still learning to be compassionate and empathize with others. On November 3rd, we all waited in anticipation, worry, and dread, but also hoped that the course of America could change for the better. The injustices we’ve experienced won’t shift overnight, but this gave us breathing room; it let us catch our breath. A shift in power gave those of us struggling some hope that an end to the rising death toll from coronavirus might quite possibly be near.

Despite these difficulties, some of us have had the privilege to escape into the crannies of our homes, finding comfort in our forced isolation from the world. Breadbaking and mask-making aside, it’s been a year of adaptability, hope, love, and grief.

In Issue No. 15, these stories are a reflection of the experiences we’ve braved this year. At Spark, we welcome our creatives to tell their truths without apologies, knowing that someone, somewhere, will deeply resonate — reminding us that, even as we’re six feet apart and through a screen, we’re not ever alone. With stories on the underlying and sometimes harmful rhetoric of the body positivity movement and the way it feels to not feel a sense of homeliness as an immigrant, I felt comfort knowing that someone out there has felt the same as I have. Someone out there could articulate my inner thoughts, the ones we keep to ourselves, into meaningful ideas for the world to read.

Amuse-Bouche is an elucidated yet conceptual word. It’s actually an appetizer in a full-course meal, where a small bite can provide the utmost refined flavor and texture. We took this rather clarified word and put it into the context of experiences, thoughts, and feelings. The result?

An immaculately organized jumbo of abstract, whimsical, obscure, and profound ideas cultivated into meaningful stories.

The world isn’t where we want it to be, but the consummate moment might not ever come. It’s okay to breathe and take advantage of the pauses that come our way. This issue is the silver lining, the creative muse we needed to let us catch our breath. We cried, we laughed, we learned what the word Amuse-Bouche means, and we served it to you on a silver platter with love, compassion, whimsy, and truth.

Stepping into the role of editor-in-chief was my silver lining amongst all the

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Maya Halabi Editor-In-Chief

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contents

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spark magazine issue no. 15 amuse-bouche

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afterthoughts within pixels, i exist raising hell for the hell of it all cutting the strings: on puppets (and ourselves) dear dead arts tonight i saw the moon juno slept here the future is now! cabinet of curiosities

40 96 196 204

editorials gemini when the clock strikes thirteen at the edge of tomorrow stuff of dreams

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8 18 26 44 50 62 68 82 104 112 140 156 172 180

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feature meet jane claire hervey, the big sister you wish you had.

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perspectives a collective cluster love is my sin they hate i found my father on a hill neither here nor there i covered to live, you lived to breathe beneath my feet meet me in the pages to the horizons i go. invaluable imperfections the inessential worker my mama’s muumuu mile cry club ode to night do you remember, gold? that’s the history, blue. find me in the costume store

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A Collective Cluster

by LAURA NGUYEN

layout ZUENA KARIM photographer ETHAN TRAN stylists KADEN GREEN & NOELLE CAMPOS hmua AMBER BRAY & LANE RICE models JANE LIU & LINDSAY GALLAGHER

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y family once lived in a vacant house sitting on the corner of University Boulevard. The house was varnished with smooth, wooden floors and a box TV that once almost smothered my sister when she was three. Unfortunate rice grains were hidden underneath the kitchen cupboards, and the third bedroom to the left was rented by an old man we endearingly called ông n᝙i.

faces that I grew up with, nor did I engrain the tiny moments that I swore to remember from back home. I vaguely remembered the first 10 years of my life. It didn't matter; I didn't care. When life decides to take what you've loved and rips the short, short roots of your origins right from beneath your feet, you forget what you really meant to people.

They faded and faded, with wisps escaping through the cracks in memory lane. As we traveled from Point A to Point B, we became alone. We became distanced from what we once knew. The sprouted seeds my family spent so long nurturing sprinkled and wilted and dried, leaving us with lonely beginnings and hard earth 1,414.6 miles away.

My mother hugged me a bit tighter each night.

My father smiled the brightest of smiles as if he had it all together. My sister waited each evening beside the corner of the street right where the school bus stopped, so every step I took off the bus wasn't alone. Seemingly, my family nestled itself right where we belonged here: with each other.

We were soon stuffed into a temporary house with two other families. There was always commotion rampaging under the roof, no matter how big or how small. Home didn't feel like home if it was cramped and unfamiliar, and all I could see was an open road that I no longer knew the name of.

We officially planted our seeds into the soil when we bought our forever home the August I began kindergarten. And, as we grew, so did the many workbooks from school on the bookshelves. First, second, third, fourth, fifth grade. Yearbooks piled, art pieces hung, words were scribbled onto aimless pages. Our house became filled with memories of growth, of lessons learned, of love. Photos stacked on shelves, VCRs were made and watched and

I know that I, along with my sister, am the daughter of an adopted Vietnamese woman In 2005, we packed our bags and upped and who traveled across the world for a loving moved, and seemingly, so did my memories, home when she had none. And we are the too. Fifteen years later, you'd never guess daughters of a Vietnamese man who fought what lived in that house. You'd never miss the tooth and limb to get aboard a ship last-minsilent halls once filled with cheers of celebrat- ute to survive the war. But, as I continue to go ing first Christmases in America, of learning back through these roots, to comb back from how to properly cook a turkey. Of finding the tree branches and into the trunk, I realize Easter egg baskets, and of discovering the that my parents were just as lost when findmany first experiences I dreamingly labeled ing that we, ourselves, were the only home home. we've known.

A couple months flew by, and I no longer wanted to preserve. I couldn't picture the

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CROCHET DRESS | Stardust Vintage PASTEL TOP | Stardust Vintage

"Would I have to now plant my own seeds, as my parents once did?" re-watched. And with every spring cleaning, we didn't have the heart to toss these memories away.

Each birthday, Christmas, Valentine's Day, Halloween, and Thanksgiving, the one thing that I woke up for was a single envelope that appeared in the mail. Signed, Uncle Dale and Aunt Janelle. These letters slid into memory boxes and onto walls so we wouldn't ever forget the love scribed to us from a thousand miles away. Rows of letters piled on walls, as did trinkets on our shelves.

It became a habit to hang these remembrances where we could, to celebrate, and keep these little pieces of love.

and mapped into my mind. I place gifts of love notes, photos, and trinkets on my walls to remind me of the warmth I experience when I am alive, when I am whole.

I stick pencils in the coffee can I bought from my favorite supermarket. It takes me back to the dim lighting and the warm smiles of the grocery store owner with just a clank of the wood hitting the metal.

Three years ago, I handed a beautiful being a stick of gum to lure her into being friends with me. Little did I know, on my 21st birthday, I would hang up a canvas of the moon, stars, and flowers that she painted for me. It sits in my bedroom, to the right of my office, so I can sit and stare and think of it.

When it came for my time to depart, 150 miles away from the only home I've known, the emptiness crept in. I stared at my col- Stamps, postcards, and ornaments from lege apartment walls all too blank, and the friends who’ve traveled the world are tacked clean slate that I had been provided. It crept onto canvases and framed up. In a way, it in on me — the insignificance, the dread. makes me feel like I’ve traveled with them Would I lose these memories, too? Would I across the borders and oceans they’ve exhave to now plant my own seeds, as my par- plored. ents once did?

A house plant made its way on my window Each morning, I wanted to remember. I sill this morning. I don't like plants, and I've wanted to remember the smiles that would never had a fickle of a green thumb. But eventually wrinkle lines at the age of 18. I when my dearest friend so earnestly showed wanted to submerge myself into each and me her healthy fig, I couldn't help but shufevery lesson those who have graced my ex- fle a random succulent into my room in istence have given me. I wanted to wake hopes of replicating some semblance of life up remembering that I'm loved, that I have within these walls. grown, that I'm not alone.

I carry these items and knowledge with Eventually, my room became a museum fea- me as if they were precious, priceless seeds, turing a collection of memories dedicated tucking them underneath the soil I would

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"Yes, I've re-planted my roots, but I may never call them my own. My legacy rests with the lives that have touched mine."

like to call home. Clutter stacks against walls as photos and artworks are stamped through thumbtacks, stuffed animals fill up the gaps between my bed and the wall.

These clusters, organized yet not, are some semblance of my life and the beings I've chosen to define it. Yes, I've re-planted my roots, but I may never call them my own. My legacy rests with the lives that have touched mine.

I want to remember this feeling of having homes, of friends resting safely in my heart and myself in theirs. I want to lull myself to sleep knowing that they exist and will forever exist. That they have fostered these fresh roots and submerged them six feet into the ground where my previous homes once lived.

As I rest my eyes in the middle of the night, I smile, knowing that I am not of one being but of all others. Thank you for being my cluster, thank you for bringing me peace. â–

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LOVE

IS

MY

THEY

SIN

HATE

by GARRETT SMITH

I felt seen in a prayer garden

layout CHIARA BOYE photographer TERESA MARTINEZ stylists ZAHA KHAWAJA & ESTHER DASHEVSKY hmua JANE LEE & TARA BHIKHA models VERONICA RASMUSSEN & RICKY MARTINEZ

SLIP DRESS | Montage

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used to crave stillness every summer. It’s the kind of quiet that only happens on mission trips at the end of the week, when the staff comes out with soft worship music and shattered pieces of rock to remind us of our sin.

It began with a prayer, and the sanctuary would go dark. A team member would begin to strum their guitar while the person praying, in soft tones that turned to piercing excitement, started shouting to God that He would touch everyone’s heart. In harmony, we said amen, and the song began. I would bawl my eyes out after the second chorus from feeling so overwhelmed. It felt too perfect, too orchestrated — as if the staff had created this atmosphere of hopelessness and complete vulnerability where you couldn’t help but feel broken, too. In these moments, I wanted to serve God better. With each trip I went on, I would pray for hours, hoping this would finally be the life-changing trip to make me feel whole. Although this feeling was only

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temporary, the symbols of the church were permanent and would grow to become part of my identity.

I remember stumbling across a small garden while walking around the grounds of this small church in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. The stench of the fresh mulch and delicate flowers immersed me in awe. A small garden fountain was decorated with cherubs, soaring around the stem of the bowl.

This petite prayer garden felt serene as I became suffocated in my thoughts on the role of cherubs in the Bible.

These baby angels were introduced in Genesis as protectors of God’s Garden of Eden, with flaming swords, and again in Ezekiel, as anointed guardians for their great perseverance. But in the garden, surrounded by nature and light, the cherubs were presented to me in a different way: I saw them as precious babies. They were innocent servants dedicated to their purpose of serving God, and I resonated with that. I myself spent my days serving God and living out a moral life in order to please Him.

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RUFFLED BLOUSE | Revival Vintage

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When no one was around, I would join in on a conversation with God. My cherub-like innocence originated from the church, and it taught me to see the world through rose-colored lenses.

I was sheltered from being independent and praised for my childlike freedom. I navigated life by being the first to run on the playground or stick my head and tongue out the window when driving. I acted with self-confidence but didn’t know what it took to be confident. My fear of intense emotions and world conflict kept my sensitive heart safe from the immoral and wretched world beyond the church.

I went along with my instructors when they split us up by gender, even though I was apprehensive. The discomfort of belonging to a group but knowing it isn’t home swelled in me until it was unbearable. Any glimpse of real, raw emotion I experienced was buried, shoved deep, and ignored until I exploded with ache. I spent years and years of pretending to fit in and forcing myself into a role that wasn’t my own. In my effort to be the cherub that protected, preserved, and remained innocent for God, I neglected myself.

I became disconnected and numb to the world around me.

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"I took a bite of the apple and the consequences followed."

I lived my life out like a cherub. My purpose in the church was to serve: I arrived early and left late. I volunteered what little strength I had stacking chairs after Bible studies. I offered a shoulder to anyone that needed support. I smiled and laughed even in the most uncomfortable situations, wanting each person I saw to feel seen and loved. I devoted my life to God in all the ways a teenage boy could. Going to church was the highlight of my day.

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I did my best until my best wasn’t enough for me. God never disappointed me — my shame did.

A new being began to dominate my heart. The darkness flooded in and clogged my arteries. Slithering its way past every organ, a serpent made its way to my heart. My lungs became heavy, and the pressure of being perfect took my breath away. My stomach began to boil, and acid in my belly spewed hate at those that hurt me. As the acid rose up in my esophagus, it burnt my tongue. I no longer wanted to mutter positive words to everyone I crossed paths with. Complete organ failure. The serpent won, and my devoted servitude was no more. Church was no longer my safe space; I was kicked out of Eden like Adam and Eve. I took a bite of the apple, and the consequences followed.

Acceptance was my sacrifice. Fear stayed in Eden, along with hate and shame, but I was free from the only person holding me back: myself. The internal conflict I had is just another story to add in the Bible, right next to Bathsheba with her two clashing titles: the passive victim of David’s temptation or the luring seductress guilty of tempting men. I am both. I am the cherub, shining with innocence and blessed with purpose, and I am the human, bound by contradiction and filled with desires and hopes beyond service. The church treated me like I was a product of temptation, and therefore, I was the temptation. I was given a life some Christian people don’t, and

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won’t, understand. They see how I dress; they see how I talk; they see my sensitivity. They see who I kiss, and it is blamed on me for giving in to sin. My single “sin” is the only trait they see, so I chose to embrace it.

I was loved there, but they loved the person I presented to them.

The few that noticed could only do so much to show it didn’t matter.

My innocence lingers two or three paces behind, always following me, reminding me of my desire to love the world like an adolescent.

However, I now walk beside a new version of myself: someone that remembers their past and is nostalgic about those memories but needed distance to explore the possibilities. I needed separation from innocence to create space for new experiences. Experiences that challenged me and allowed me to find a love for myself. I demanded a place where I didn’t have to teach others how to love me and accept me. They would see me and automatically know I am whole. Today, I often try to place myself in that garden and recreate the sweeping emotion I felt. Every sense was engaged with; I can remember the tickle in my nose of fresh florals and the undulating rhythm guiding my ears to serenity by a fountain of water. On that day, my eyes stared into the eyes of cherubs decorating the fountain.

Now, when I place myself back there, I see my reflection — a bold cherub loudly guarding my holy place with flaming swords. ■

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I Found My Father On A Hill

by CAMERON KELLY

layout PRANAV SUBRAMANIAN photographer RACHEL AQUINO stylist ABBY LODGE hmua CAMERON KELLY model MAYA FAWAZ

WHITE DRESS | OddBall Vintage

My journey began the day you died.

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“An end of the journey that I knew and loved. The beginning of a journey into the unknown."

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n end of the journey that I knew and loved. The beginning of a journey into the unknown."

These were the words you left before leaving for the last time. Little did I know that I, too, was walking into an unknown — a world that was dark and lonely.

My memories of you are too many. Most of them are vivid yet have dissipated with time. I remember the times I rode with you in your semi-truck off to work. I would sit on your lap, and you would point out the names and models of other trucks that traversed the road ahead. Still today, I find myself reciting their names as I hear their rumble pass me on the highway. Often, I sit and watch these memories wisp away like motes of dust floating in a breeze, wishing one day my fingers will pluck one out of the evening sky.

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“My footprints seem to catch up with me as they dissolve into dust and join the haze ahead.”

While these memories veiled me from my own reality, nothing could save me from the clutter of voices rambling behind. Voices spewed my failures, telling me that I could never reach my own aspirations without your guidance. From the commotion behind me, I hear your voice from the pages of your final testament, “I could see my sons enjoying their lives, becoming strong and … everything in the world that a father hopes for his sons.” Yes, Dad, I am strong, and I hope that I’m everything you hoped for. But, I can’t be your son, nor can I be your ideal.

I’ve let go of these expectations, and I’ve released them into the breeze that surrounds me.

They blended with grains of sediment clouding the hills in the distant horizon. While I’ve walked many desolate hills, my footprints seem to catch up with me as they dissolve into dust and join the haze ahead. When they catch up, I see you walking beside me, hand in hand. We both look to the hills ahead, and I’m scared of what’s yet to come.

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“We both look to the hills ahead, and I’m scared of what’s yet to come.”

When I think of your embrace, I can feel your warmth swaddling me, telling me that it’s okay to embark on a new hill as your beloved daughter. Though the dirt may slip beneath my feet, I can find you as my anchor in the shifting ground. Still, there will be times where I sink through the warped sediment, struggling to resurface. When I extend my arm to breech, I’ll see your hand on the other side, ready to rescue me. And when I finally reach the peak of my hill, I’ll look back to see your silhouette waving at me in the setting sun.

As I turn to face the night ahead of me, I know that your love will guide me on my next excursion. Maybe this place wasn’t so dark after all — I just needed to accept your light. ■

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WITHIN PIXELS, I EXIST

by CLARISSA RODRÍGUEZ ABREGO

layout SHUER ZHUO photographer KAITLYN MARCATANTE stylists CALEB ZHANG & ZAHA KHAWAJA hmua GABRIELLE DUHON model KRISTY THAI

"THE GOOD CRIES, THE UGLY CRIES, THE STRANGER WHO SMILED AT ME ON THE STREET — ANYTHING THAT, EVEN FOR JUST A SECOND, REMINDS ME THAT THERE’S MORE TO THIS BODILY FLESH."

J

oss Fong, a journalist and curious at heart, says that for three years, she recorded every time she cried on an Excel spreadsheet.

She sectioned her tears, color-coded them accordingly, and made graphs out of them — converting them into something more translatable, at the brink of understandability.

“When I cry, it feels like I’ve become a different person,” she says, smiling at her own intricacies.

Perhaps it’s that fear of one's rawness that led her to try and make sense out of her tears. Perhaps that’s why, when I’m turning into more soul than body, I open up my phone’s Notes app and keep snippets of life with me. The good cries, the ugly cries, the stranger who smiled at me on the street — anything that, even for just a second, reminds me that there’s more to this bodily flesh.

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More times than I’d like to admit, I prefer to pour everything out onto a rectangular piece of glass and metal than to have it weighing inside of me. Since 2016, I’ve kept notes of the times when anything has kicked me out of numbness: when I've flown up high and could almost be celestial, or dragged down low, falling into the arms of my own labyrinths.

I can’t say my records are as readable as Joss’.

They’re messy conversations with myself on Facebook Messenger and misspelled, quick jots on my phone’s Notes app. Still, I suppose that says something about it all — how urgent everything seems and is, the sudden racing on my heartbeat, the tingles down my arms. Call it a ritual, second nature, or attempted escape: all is true and the same.

I’d like to think that I do this with hopes of breaking free, like a heroic writer typing for the sake of it, eager to pour down some universal truth onto a page. But more often than not, it starts out of fear. Fear of not feeling the same way ever again, fear of forgetting that this ever happened — that I, we, happened.

I want to always have January 7th, 2020, when I unconsciously said to my mom, “te quiero mucho,” and she, undoubtedly, replied, “yo te amo más.” Not once taking her love a step below.

How she showed me, in a matter of seconds, the truest form of unconditionality.

"FEAR OF NOT FEELING THE SAME WAY EVER AGAIN, FEAR OF FORGETTING THAT THIS EVER HAPPENED — THAT I, WE, HAPPENED."

I don't know where my fascination with pickand-choose remembrance comes from. Sometimes, it doesn’t come at all. Sometimes, I rely on the fragility of memory to comfort myself. I train my brain to understand that I’ve forgotten pain before. I’ve lived through the awkwardness, the shakiness, and always, always the tip-toeing.

And still, I have made it to the other side alive.

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"I WRITE THE TIMES I’VE FELT THE PUREST HAPPINESS BECAUSE I CAN’T BEAR THE THOUGHT OF THEM NEVER COMING BACK TO ME."

But then again, there are the times I need to remember.

The conversations, the way my sister always lets her coffee get cold just to reheat it all over again.

The way my father started randomly singing in the car on that December of 2018, and how my mom and sisters laughed, how we all did. The way I consciously looked around — everyone with their glistening eyes and silly little smiles on — and I could almost taste the sweet tanginess of happiness in my mouth.

On Christmas of that same year, at 5:16 p.m., my grandfather told me he’d like to still be around for my graduation. He was sitting on the porch of my uncle’s house; I know for sure it was cold, but when I think about it, all I can picture is the warm orange paint on the walls and colorful plants attempting to overcome the cemented floors.

There are the bittersweet successes, too. How 2019 was the first year I didn’t remember the birthday of the first boy I loved and who inevitably broke my heart. The one who lingered, filled my ears with little sweet nothings, and held my hands and books after class. Then, left me to ruminate around my own mind, yearning for

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"I OFTEN FORGET THE HEIGHTS WE CAN GO TO. BUT IT ALL HAS TO BE TRUE — I HOLD THE PROOF OF ITS EXISTENCE."

the times I didn’t know my heartbreak had its home along the crevices of my throat and my stomach.

I know all of this because I keep it all with me, encapsulated within the black and white pixels of my Notes app. I turn to technology because it’s the easiest thing to do. It’s less daunting to interact with my insides when I do it through something so opposite, something that I’m always holding. The beats of my heart almost get lost in the clickings of my keyboard.

I don’t know who decided that all burdens stem from pain. Sometimes, the mere thought of dealing with the finality of something good makes me sick to my stomach. I write the times I’ve felt the purest happiness because I can’t bear the thought of them never coming back to me.

Still, I probably should tell you now that I rarely ever open my Notes. That, whenever I stumble upon one of them, it feels like an out-of-body experience. That I often forget the heights we can go to. But it all has to be true — I hold the proof of its existence.

Like an anchor amidst the come and go of the ocean, I cling for dear life. Then, I press the home button twice, swipe up, and go on. ■

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M I E N

layout NATHAN HAN & JENNIFER JIMENEZ photographer ALYSSA OLVERA stylist DAVID GARCIA hmua SARAH STILES models NICOLE RUDAKOVA & PRESLEY SIMMONS

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JUMP SUIT | Luxe BELT | Revival EARRINGS | Austin Pets Alive CUFF BRACELETS | Austin Pets Alive

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Neither Here Nor There Ni aquí ni allá

BY DIVINA CENICEROS DOMINGUEZ

Ni aquí ni allá

BY DIVINA CENICEROS DOMINGUEZ

layout GRACE DAVILA & JULEANNA CULILAP photographer ALEC MARTINEZ stylists JOSEANE TEJADA & NOELLE CAMPOS hmua ADRIANNE GARZA & LILY CARTAGENA models LUIS CAMARENA KUCHLE & NANI VILLALVAZO

To make arroz con leche: bring ingredients a boil, stir gently, and know that no matter how many times you make it, it won’t ever taste as good as Mami’s.

Ingredients:

COTTAGE DRESS OVERALLS | Revival Vintage GREEN SILK BUTTON UP | Revival Vintage

1 1/2 cups of rice 1 cup of water 1 cups of milk 1 cup of condensed milk 1 cup of evaporated milk 1 large stick of cinnamon 1/2 cup of raisins Garnish with a sprinkle of ground cinnamon

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he way you make arroz con leche is the way many of us first experience love. You have to let the rice soak for a good while before it even touches the pan, allowing it to expand and, therefore, receive.

I was four years old when my tiny foot first landed on American soil. The hot air that tangled my hair, the kind of heat that makes you sleepy and rest your head on the car window, was just as familiar as it was in Mexico. Only now, I was in Texas — Laredo, Texas.

The city itself is as ordinary as any other. It’s small enough where you can sneeze, and, in the millisecond that you’ve closed your eyes, you’d find yourself in a neighboring city’s I-35 wondering how the fuck you missed your exit.

Its radius makes you feel like you know everyone and, for better or worse, everyone knows you.

It took a while to adapt to my new world and even longer to embrace it. Laredo was the place I should’ve, but never actually, called home for the 13 years I lived there. Most of my time there felt like watching water boil. Just waiting for something to happen. Waiting for me to happen.

Time just has a different way of working there.

There’s a stillness to the city. It’s not a race but a slow simmer, a long exhale — like steam wafting out from the pot with milk and cinnamon on a rolling boil. Still, I’ve grown to like its cadence. I’ve now made Austin my home, but it’s not till I’m back in Laredo that I ever seem to exhale, too. A piece of my heart opens, and, for a moment, and I’m reminded of all the things I’ve grown to love there.

"This 'nothing feels like home' feeling — I don’t know it yet."

The way you make arroz con leche is the way many of us learn to talk: little by little, slowly unlocking and continuing the traditions that your mother, and her mother and her mother (and so on) passed on to you.

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"I live in a country that doesn’t love me, but I’m somehow expected to love back."

When I’m back, I don’t have to speak a single word of English. Instead, I speak Spanish — the language that was there with me during my first words and the stories that were passed down to me by my mother, and her mother and, well, you know how it goes. I speak my language to preserve my history. Still, because my life is in this country, I find myself stumbling, forgetting, and holding words at the tip of my tongue when they used to flow with ease. Life is hard, and death comes faster than you’d think.

Every November 1st, I light a white candle for everyone I’ve lost. I place it on the altar with the little marigold flowers, papel picado, and decades-old tequila bottles I’ve yet to open, but I know my great-grandfather would enjoy — wherever he is.

We make our loved one’s favorite foods for Dia de los Muertos and leave them on the altar. I wonder what my children will leave for me. If I think hard enough, I can just taste the smell of tomatoes and onions on a skillet every morning with two sunny-side-up eggs and my grandmother’s serrano pepper and avocado salsa verde.

The one that makes my tongue burn and eyes water.

The kind you can’t find anywhere else but the white and green little house I grew up in; the one that’s three blocks away from the train tracks and the big Catholic church.

PINK BUTTON UP | Revival Vintage BROWN BUTTON UP | Revival Vintage SUEDE VEST | Stardust Vintage

My people are seas of stained glass.

I can close my eyes but still see the kaleidoscope of fully saturated colors on the Sunday church service: greatgrandmothers with their flower-embroidered shawls that bloom like spring; men with caterpillar handlebar mustaches and golden belt buckles that shine like justice; girls with colorful ribbons in their braids that weave together like three-headed snakes.

This “nothing feels like home” feeling — I don’t know it yet. Laredo was the place that made me who I am today, but I still can’t bring myself to call it home. I was four years old when my tiny foot first landed on American soil, but to many, I’m not anywhere other than the wrong side of the line drawn on the imaginary sand. As punishment, I was exiled into a limbo of uncertainty for almost two decades. A reality where Mexico is just a blinking star in the sky, a mirage of what once was. A reality where I’m just another faceless “illegal” immigrant, another stack of paperwork to process that still has yet to arrive.

During these past four years, I’m reminded daily that my existence doesn’t matter. I live in a country that doesn’t love me, but I’m somehow expected to love back. When I close my eyes to sleep, the dark inside my eyes sees no American Dream — only a blur of nameless immigration

"Every day I spend in Austin, I lose my language little by little; I replace the foods I grew up with; I forget the stories that my mother and her mother and her mother whispered to their children." lawyers and 17 years of maybe-this-year’s whispered every four years on November 3rd’s. Will I ever be able to take my shoes off in a place that urges me to run away?

When I’m sad enough, my thoughts struggle to define exactly what community is. Is citizenship a prerequisite? I was born in Mexico, but I doubt I can truly be part of a community I’ve barely been a physical part of. Every day I spend in Austin, I lose my language little by little; I replace the foods I grew up with; I forget the stories that my mother and her mother and her mother whispered to their children. I’m my mother’s daughter, but also the conglomeration of my experiences outside of her.

You can throw a stone in Laredo, Texas and have it land in Nuevo Laredo, Mexico. I’m a blink-of-an-eye away from my home country but haven’t set my foot on it since that hot, windy day 17 years ago. Laredo is the only place where I can taste a piece of my heritage, but only through the windowpane. Still, if I ever go back to Mexico, will I come to the realization that I’ve spent my entire childhood romanticizing a country that didn’t care about me enough to invest in my life when I was there? I feel more Texan than I do American, and on good days, Mexican enough.

But when I’m with my people, my community, my loved ones, and all the other in-betweens of people who’ve shaped me, I don’t really care about identity at all.

Laredo, Texas, was my happy medium. The city itself is as ordinary as any other. It taught me not to drive, not to swim, and not to serve arroz con leche until the next morning — when it’s 8 a.m., and four screaming children wake the whole damn house up. The one on Guerrero street, with the yellow brick wall and the olive tree in the front yard. Only there, it seems, we’re all together sitting on a wooden dining table that belonged to my mother, and her mother, and her mother, and her mother.

With them, I’m not an immigrant, I’m not worried or anxious or looking over my shoulder, I’m not American or Mexican-American or Latinx or anything else.

Laredo never really became my home, but maybe immigrants like me never get to find a home. Maybe home isn’t where the heart is, but in my footprints — scattered in little pieces like raisins on your arroz con leche, along the mountains of Monterrey, the hot earth of Laredo, and the rolling hills of Austin. ■

I COVERED TO LIVE, YOU LIVED TO BREATHE

by EUNICE BAO layout MICHELLE COLLINS & JULEANNA CULILAP

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We hold our breaths under the vast blue sky. There’s something in the air ...

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hen my mom proactively mailed me boxes of face masks on the eve of March, I rolled my eyes and stuffed them to the back of my closet. I can’t wear these in public — imagine the reactions. Only keeping a bottle of hand sanitizer with me, I continued my daily commute to campus mask-free.

The world went on pause two weeks after, and my mom turned out to be right. Face masks seeped into our society as sudden as the sky darkens at sunset. From the dirty masks discarded along the streets to the, “I forgot my mask, I’m running late”, texts — this is America now with no end in sight.

I think back to another time, another place, where all of this is strangely reminiscent. 北京 BEIJING The sky brightens to a dull gray hue as I walk to the subway station. I checked the air quality index before I left my home and today’s purple signaled another day of wearing masks to breathe. Along the sidewalk, aunties are beginning to set up all kinds of mini shops — cute keychains, handmade bracelets, embroidered face masks. I rush past them; I don’t have time to chat today.

Beijing’s subway rush hour is notorious for a reason — the crowd can, and will, swallow you up.

Barely catching the 7:40 a.m., I head to the end of the train where there’s usually the least amount of people.

Standing next to the window and away from my fellow mask-wearers, I recognize the eyes of some familiar strangers, but there’s no need for small talk on our daily commute.

"From the dirty masks discarded along the streets to the, “I forgot my mask, I’m running late,” texts — this is America now with no end in sight."

Through the elevated train’s window speckled with dust, I witness the hazy city awaken. Soft sunlight above glows through the mist, but the sun herself hides behind the blanket of smog. If I really squint, I can see a faint outline of the hills that border the outskirts of Beijing, the factories that cough up smoke into the already muddled sky. My heart breaks at each vignette, longing for a blue sky that can only be seen in the mountains.

When the subway arrives at my stop, I push through the now crowded train. There is no concept of personal space in an ocean of people, so we all keep our masks on. Even inside, masks are both a protective barrier and a consideration for others — it’s public transportation’s unspoken rule. I savor the last moments of fresh airconditioning before stepping back out into the dusty world.

During my middle school’s lunch break, teachers let us go outside because the air quality today isn’t that bad (at least, compared to a day with a darker purple color on the index.) Still, we wear our masks while playing at the playground. We run around the field and jump on the swings even though we can’t feel the air rushing through our lungs. Our laughter fills the outside; we almost don’t notice the ashen atmosphere around us.

If we’re lucky, the air pollution will disappear for a day.

We call these days, “blue sky holidays,” for we celebrate an unpolluted sky. I linger a little longer on my way to the subway station, stopping to say hi to the aunties.

On these days, us city folk walk with a bounce in our step, heads held high to receive the long-awaited kiss of sunshine. Abroad the subway, we still keep our masks on because they have already become a part of us, pro-

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tecting others and the distance between us. I stand at my usual spot in awe of how the light gushes into the concrete jungle.

Even teachers take classes outside for us to soak in every second of the crystal clear sky. We revel in our newfound ability to see each other’s smiles and breathe in the warm Beijing breeze without suffocating.

With the sun’s rise and fall each day, life goes on.

AUSTIN, TX In the land of sunny Texas — halfway across the world — almost every day is a blue sky holiday. The pollution is hidden, seeping through the heart of our society and quite literally into our lungs. The capital city empties with the impending pandemic, and the luminous blue sky paints a backdrop for the silent killer that is COVID-19.

As my daily commute now consists of me going from my bed to my desk, I find myself missing public transportation and the strangers on the Beijing subway. Whether the view outside looked apocalyptic or picturesque, we always had an unspoken connection.

The only consistent “public transportation” here are the elevators I take to my apartment’s fifth-floor parking lot. On most elevators pre-pandemic, we would nod and say, “how are you,” to fill the air of awkwardness that marks a confined space. I’ve always thought people didn’t actually want to know how you are, and in a way, I was right. Now with masks, and some even without masks, we stand at our respective corners — barely six

"The pollution is hidden, seeping through the heart of our society and quite literally into our lungs. The capital city empties with the impending pandemic, and the luminous blue sky paints a backdrop for the silent killer that is COVID-19."

feet apart — holding our breaths and looking at the ceiling until we arrive at our floors after the longest minute of our lives.

We see masks as a nuisance, an obligation. And I feel it too. I wouldn’t have given it a second thought in Beijing, but here, I rolled my eyes when my mom sent me a box of masks back in March and again when she sent protective gloves, alcohol wipes, and more masks a week later when things got worse. Much worse. As the pandemic escalated, so did our attitude towards masks — wearing them in March was akin to coughing in public. We see them now as less of a taboo, but they remain a controversy. If the stigma against masks taught me anything, I learned that freedom and individuality are essential to our lives in the U.S. that we deem anything preventing it as suffocating. But slowly, I’m learning to unlearn the stigma and remember my time half the world away: how I used to wear masks every day and actually liked the way it connected me with my fellow commuters.

Against Beijing’s dreadful sky, we wore a mask to live and breathe well. Here in warm Austin, the skies are the bluest I’ve ever seen — everything that I’ve wished for and more. But there’s something in the air. People live for convenience, for freedom, even at the expense of safety. Life is different, and we don’t know when, if ever, we can return to the same toil under the sun. ■

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se

n I t 's o

ph a t

a

rebelli s ' on it .

g n i rais hell for the hell of it all

by MARISSA RODRIGUEZ layout JENNIFER JIMENEZ photographer ERIN DORNEY stylists MARNIE MATTHEWS & ALYSSA LIN hmua JANE LEE model BRIONNA WILLIAMS

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had uncles in other states as a kid. I’d never met them all, but there was an astrophysicist, a truck driver, and a … punk rocker who makes Godzilla replicas (the garden variety, if you will.) Bruce, the punk rock extraordinaire of Ohio, was abundantly more fascinating than all of them (my apologies to the astrophysicist.)

He had constructed his life from his passions at a young age and never separated the two. Even as he ages, his youth screams louder than my own.

In the 80s, he toured his fiery anthems with a floppy mass of hair, and a crowd that voiced through the haze. It was political, it was rambunctious, it was wildly out of the ordinary for a midwestern, middle-class teen — and it’s the same energy he thrives with today. It isn’t that he never grew up; it’s that he knew what he wanted before anyone else knew what life was supposed to be.

Bruce grew up in a small, cardboard town. The stagnant city often left creative souls like Bruce in a junction of becoming their parents. My grandma put him in guitar lessons at the YMCA as a creative outlet. He always loved to draw, and he loved music. At his core, he was an artist looking for an identity, a dream, something. Something to break the small town curse of an “ideal” life that’s never, it seemed to him, truly an honest one.

Later in his teen years, he found it. A band named DOA came through town, and the hardcore songs brought something out of him. It was nothing like he had ever heard before but everything he had known. He loved the performance, the spontaneity, the mistakes, and the fire. He came back and switched out the Fleetwood Mac records for ones he picked up at the show, scaring his poor mother. Soon, he was asking her to give him a “punk” haircut and sneaking into every show he could find.

This crucial time is the exact reason he ensured his band always played the little towns when they eventually went on tour. A new world had enveloped him. It brought out a soul fired by passion. The feelings of a teen come so intensely from nothing, but they stay forever. How exciting is it to find personality with nothing driving you but ambition.

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"Being young and wi ld and fr ee is beauti f and it' ul, s everyt hing your p arents Ever h oped you'd b e" amuse-bouche

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That differentiating moment he had was so fiery, so extraordinary, so important for someone from a town of uniformity. Everyone finds this at some point. You breathe in and exhale a thought your parents have never dreamed of. It’s growing up, even if from the outside, it looks like immaturity. To be young and wild is to be intelligent. In a way, these are the most important thoughts you’ll ever have, because they’re the first ones you made on your own.

My grandma always says Bruce was a sensitive kid.

He was loving and caring and rejected the turmoils of life. Perhaps that’s what brought out the anti-war mantras. He had a belief system that transitioned into a livelihood. Some like to say in-between scoffs and eye rolls that the “crazed,” “drugged,” free roamers of the 80s punk scene were kidding themselves.

That they weren’t old enough or wise enough or lucid enough to be taken seriously.

But how could a kid who went against everything he grew up around be immature? How could someone who was so eternally intertwined with his ideals be confused? Sure, they were a tad wild. His band did live in a van for seven years, and there was a period where they lived off nothing but potatoes. Yes, a few shows had a fog around them from the LSD and weed — an aspect crucial to the atmosphere but perhaps detrimental to the music. And for the life of me, I still can’t get the story of why he was kicked out of Canada out of anyone.

But his music was rebellion with a cause. It punched his beliefs into the atmosphere of those who identified with it. At the end of the day, rebellion is just confidence. It’s determination. It’s independence.

It’s standing up for what you believe in. Being young and wild and free is beautiful, and it’s everything your parents ever hoped you’d be.

Now, his music was definitely not for the faint of

heart. I asked my grandma if she ever listened to it.

She said she would have, but she couldn’t tell what they were saying. “It was too loud,” she said.

Understandable. However, if we do decipher their music, we’d discover it spoke about hating war.

They hated Reagan. A lot. They rejected conformity.

They rejected the government. Today, he sees some things a little differently, but for the most part, he hasn’t changed. Today, he will still outline his fiery opinions to anyone who challenges them.

He still believes in freedom. He still lives the rebellion. He doesn’t necessarily have a curfew anymore, but his tattoos, leather jackets, and foul mouth will tell you he hasn’t lost his edge. He plays in bars and clubs, and even the occasional reunion tour.

That’s the fascinating part: When I first met him, he walked in the door and looked like the living image of what I’d seen from the photos of before. In his heyday, he toured everywhere from San Francisco to Liverpool, even on TV a few times. And the magic is he’d fucking do it again.

It’s not a phase when it’s your identity. It’s not a moment when it’s the rest of your life. He was empowered in a small concert in Dayton, Ohio and never let go of that. He found independence and freedom at a young age in a way that would scare most of us.

Personally, I don’t know who I am or what I want yet. Not like he did. I don’t have the maturity it takes for rebellion yet. But I’ll get there — and if any of you have found it, don’t settle down.

Cherish life as an individual who realizes beliefs as a statement. Scream through the haze of angst until you’re 60, and you look back on today and grin at the guts you had to be so goddamn wild. Grow into the version of yourself who exhibits life the most. ■

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"How exciting is it to find y t i l a n o s r e p with nothing driving you but ambition." amuse-bouche

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We are but plastic and wood. No, not in the way one might think. Apart from the myriad wrappers we throw away, the glossy temporariness of the devices we’re so addicted to, and the very structures which hold up the walls around us and hold down the ground beneath our feet, we are but plastic and wood.

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beneath my feet

by SWETHA BERANA

layout KIERA DIXON photographer ALYSSA OLVERA set design DAVID GARCIA

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I was content looking outside in. Everyone was but plastic and wood in this house. The trials and tribulations of life were mere orchestrations, and I was the maestro.

But plastic never grows — it stays content with its smiling, painted-on face.

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And so my decision to try and embrace my plastic-ness began — my journey of living through the machinations of the world. amuse-bouche

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I turned into one of my dolls, playing along to the machinations of someone else, letting the world control me and my self-worth as emotions coursed through me ... I was trapped in the world of rules and what’s okay, trying to let it all out through parties and distractions and people and a cold hard plastic smile to cover up my true alone-ness.

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The dollhouse. It was the strange largeness I felt, touching an object I knew meant the world to me when I was little, but it was so small and insignificant that I couldn’t understand why. Yet I felt a strange sense of nostalgia: the desire to be on the outside looking in.

It was an ideal world, but it was still my own world. If I could make things however I wanted in this miniature world, why couldn’t I take control over my real life?

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MEET ME IN THE PAGES

by CAMPBBELL WOODS

layout MADDIE SIEDELL photographer ABBY BURGY stylist MADDIE SIEDELL hmua ELLIANNA ARREOLA & IZABELLA HILMI models NICOLE RUDAKOVA & ERICA XU

Where minds dance freely to the unapologetic aura of independence and ambition glitters through empty souls, making them glow again.

Tom Sawyer used to wait for me every morning. I think back to my seventh grade English class, where I would escape into a world of white picket fences and green oak trees, basking in the fresh aroma of adventure in late spring. Each time I walked through that classroom door, Mark Twain’s stories comforted me in a way that I had never felt before; I was more connected to the character’s lives than to the people that surrounded me.

I think about the colder months, when we read “The Outsiders” and had to memorize Robert Frost’s poem “Nothing Gold Can Stay.” What were initially words I shakily recited in front of the class eventually shaped a huge part of my outlook on life: to stay gold, just like Ponyboy. Staying gold to me meant staying aware of the beautiful things in life, never letting a sunset go down without admiring its colors, and always cherishing the poetry that lies within a little moment. amuse-bouche

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“I ran freely into their worlds blooming with ambition and wonder, just often enough to keep my knees scraped and my dreams golden.”

So with Tom’s hand in my hand and Robert in my soul, I ran freely into their worlds blooming with ambition and wonder, just often enough to keep my knees scraped and my dreams golden. I kept my footprints fresh in dirt roads; I played beneath the oak trees; I bloomed with the flowers and rested at sunsets, taking in every color. Golden, glowing, laughing. I swore I could’ve lived off of that pure creativity for the rest of my life.

I never registered the consequences that would come with being so openly raw to life.

I still met with Robert during sunsets, and Tom waited for me beneath green oak trees in the summers. But as sunsets burned into the horizon day after day, and the cold breath of time iced the green leaves into bare branches, I tucked Tom Sawyer into my back pocket and shushed Robert Frost to a feathery whisper. Without that sweet escape, I wasn’t reminded as often how important it was to pay attention to the poetry.

My meaning of staying gold changed with the world that began to swallow me whole — a world where eyes laughed mockingly at my reach for adventure and judgment stripped the gold from my soul, grinding it down to a dull grey. My worth became just another play in the game of their inclusion, and validation was the prize. It lay waiting for me behind the stubborn walls of rejection that I had to break down only by breaking myself.

I couldn’t give up on the fight, for the repercussions of feeling like I wasn’t good enough were too humiliating for me to face. I started to see a trail of gold following behind me

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in sad, broken pieces. I screamed at Robert, “Pick them up! Help me!” but they melted into the terrain of selfdoubt. Uncertainty looming in the distance, I began to break at the beck of tomorrow’s calls. Be better, try harder, grow up. I threw away everything that I felt made me different from the crowd I so badly wanted acceptance from, believing it would make me lighter, easier to bring over the walls. As I fought through with tears streaming and fists clenched, I realized how naive I had been to believe that being soft would get me anywhere. And soon, I found myself facing the last wall standing. Tom Sawyer reached his hand out, and while my heart swelled to seek something beyond these walls with him, I rejected my old dreams the only way I knew how to at this point. Without mercy. And finally, I reached the center at last, but I only found a broken mirror reflecting someone I could barely recognize. My knees weren’t scraped, and my face was worn by the endless search for acceptance that I never seemed to be enough for. This world is all an illusion, but I’ve realized it too late.

Now, as I walk through this old bookstore, I feel like I’m visiting an old friend that I have long outgrown.

I expect rejection as I go through the books, picking some up and flipping through the different pages. As I run my fingers along the rough fabric, tracing the names engraved spines, my hand lands Make sureintototheir keep these spreads 4-8 on a book by Jack Kerouac. Jack Kerouac, a beatnik pages!

Have fun ofwith this and dont writer who wrote at the seams the sixties liberation movement.

Jack, whose words were the leaders stress about this assignment for !! It’s just the dreamers. Jack, who writes of beaten-down paths practice get love familiar with Jack, the brand and starry skies,to of tender and firing passion. who tells me that my life is a, “vast glowing and empty guides and messing with placement of page, I could do anything I want.”

things! You can always look at previous

Why haven’t I met Jack? Why it have been or conspreads onyou,issuu if couldn’t you’re stuck when I lay breathless on the cold tile of my kitchen fused or you can ofalways reach floor, shattered at the seams my self-worth?

An out to excitement overtakes me as I peer into this new world, one of us! and I feel the sense that something is changed, what it feels like to dream again.

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Take me into your world, Jack. Where minds dance freely to the unapologetic aura of independence and ambition glitters through empty souls, making them glow again.

Infuse me into your poetry, make me sound beautiful. How do you abide by your intuition so easily? How do you not hold yourself back? I’ve always been afraid of change, but now the thought of staying the same terrifies me. I am too open; I have seen too much of this other version of who I am that has revealed herself through your words. She is broken free from this superficiality that has raised her and released into the soft breeze of California; she knows what it means to dream.

Fueled by the possibility of the unknown, she isn’t afraid of being lost. Of looking dumb. Of feeling worthless in the eyes of others, or of being measured up to some imaginary idea of what she should be. Let me bask in the uncertainty and give me the map to nowhere.

This golden light I sought for so long shines only in the comfort of words that make me feel understood in all of my brokenness, vibrant with possibility. I realize my dreams die in the expectation to be something tomorrow. So I refuse to give them to tomorrow; I grab it by each moment and let them enfold me.

It’s easy to read these words and think I could be different. Better. But right now, I am everything I thought I wasn’t. As I run forward, I can hear Robert’s sweet voice harmonizing with Tom’s footsteps. I am ready to meet them again. ■ 72

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“This golden light I sought for so long shines only in the comfort of words that make me feel understood in all of my brokenness, vibrant with possibility.� amuse-bouche

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Cutting the Strings:

On Puppets & Ourselves

by ELYSSA SEFIANE

layout GRACE DAVILA photographer NICK BARNES stylist SHINI WANG hmua JULIA HOLSTEIN model PRESLEY SIMMONS

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A A A A

puppet is a plaything ‌ pawn, a part of a production. puppet is not Real. puppet does not have a soul.

You are human ...

You play up to and perform for your invisible masters.

You struggle to define your complex reality.

You are still trying to make sense of your soul.

There is nothing alike in a human and a puppet.

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HANDPAINTED 80S DRESS | Charm School Vintage CHEROKEE 70S PLATFORM HEELS | Charm School Vintage CHAIN BELT | Charm School Vintage

"Even his anthropomorphic wooden body could never satisfy his desire to be wholly actualized, to be seen in the eyes of others as Real and a person ...

and nothing in between."

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O

n the stage, everything that can be imagined can also be conveyed. There are hardly any limits to the instrumentation that makes this possible. Cosmetics enhance features or create entirely new ones, costumes serve to slim and bulk in ways that completely alter shapes, and the body contorts in strange displays, becoming a canvas for a wide range of emotions.

Nonetheless, there are still confines to the expressive capacities of even the most dramatic actor.

The bounds of human anatomy are ultimately restricted in scope. All the cosmetics and costumes in the world can only go so far in reproducing the most surreal of concepts and the most inhuman of characters. And so, the stage must find ways to expand beyond the realm of what is humanly possible to keep up the illusion that nothing can really stop the show from going on.

In some productions, it is puppetry that further enables this illusion. Through the art of marionettes, ventriloquy, and even shadows, puppetry personifies props to carry stories into new dimensions of possibility.

In spite of the artistry behind it, there is still something, well, creepy about puppetry that seems especially pervasive in current cultural interactions with the form. Automatonophobia, the fear of humanlike figures, is common in many people’s experiences with puppets.

As I try to decipher potential reasons for this, my mind goes back to watching Tim Burton’s Coraline in 2009. I was eight years old, fairly grown, and proudly unfazed by the dark and the dentist and other childish fears. But even then, the stop motion puppets unnerved me to my core. There was something so emotionless, yet so real behind the disjointed clay movements and buttoned eyes of the characters — so real and yet, not quite Real enough.

I knew then why in the Pinocchio story I had been told since childhood, the little marionette with a soul and emotions still wished on a star to be made a human boy.

Even his anthropomorphic wooden body could never satisfy his desire to be wholly actualized, to be seen in the eyes of others as Real and a person and nothing in between.

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I remember how much I saw myself in Coraline, despite her being made of clay. Even at my young age, the lengths she went to ground herself in reality again after being displaced in a fantastical world far away from home seemed eerily familiar.

mean, on a cosmic scale, to have souls and to exist? Religion and spirituality have all tried to make sense of this, but it is still a question with no single verdict. And like Pinocchio, we all bow to the strings of what society expects of us, so often hinging our social interactions on the politics of acceptability. We morph our everyday lives into little stage productions of their own.

This makes me think that it is the elasticity of their humanity that disturbs us the most. For a brief moment, we find ourselves empathizing with the puppet as they emote and search for meaning just as we do.

Maybe the true uncanniness lies not in the elements of ourselves we see in puppets, but in the elements of puppets we see in ourselves.

Like Coraline, we all desperately try to make sense of a reality that seems flimsy and, at times, imagined. What does it

Like pawns to some invisible puppetmaster, we are intimately controlled:

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By our fear of the unknown and of never finding meaning, which manifests itself in all-consuming existential dread that frequently leads to depression and anxiety.

By our inability to escape the influences of others that permeate everything from our respective cultural norms to the unspoken standards of beauty we see in the media.

For the puppet, when the curtains are drawn, the encore fades, and the strings are at last loosened, the stage light reveals the lifelessness behind its eyes that was there all along. Pinocchio goes back into his box, forever paused at the borderland of Toy and Real Boy.

By our own vices and vanities, which might dictate our whims more than the sensibility of our higher selves.

But it is not the same for you. As much as you may have exhausted your day at the hands of your invisible masters, you have the chance to climb under the covers and be reminded of your humanity.

As we are daily subjected to these forms of control, can we ever fully be agents of our own desires? Can we cut the strings and declare ourselves human and nothing in between?

When the sun goes down and you are no longer performing for anyone, the soft cricket of your conscience chirps, Now, love, you can rest. In your dreams you can be as Real as you want to be. â–

The answer is not that simple, but if I have one assurance for you, it is this:

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"Pinocchio goes back into his box, forever paused at the borderland of

Toy & Real Boy."

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T O TH E HOR I ZO NS I GO

by OLIVIA DU

layout PRANAV SUBRAMANIAN photographer KIM PAGTAMA stylist MARNIE MATTHEWS hmua ADRIANNE GARZA & ELLIANNA ARREOLA models REBEKAH VERGHESE & SUSANNA WANG

Underneath the wide expanse of moon and sun, I learn to love myself .

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he moon, a curious giant, peers into my room.

She sees me drowning in billowing swaths of darkness, ensnared by the crippling thoughts of unspoken regrets and paralyzing fear, and she moves on. I am left behind, trapped in the cages of my thoughts. And I am alone.

When I was younger, every time I felt lonely at night, I would stumble to my mom’s bedroom in the dark and ask her to lay with me until I fell asleep. The warmth of someone nearby was just enough to lull me into repose. In my budding years, the same need manifested in the words, “妈 妈, I’m lonely.” Met with the gentle but firm reminder, “睿睿. . . In order to truly grow up, you need to learn how to be happy alone.”

But Mom, I’m 18 now, and I’m still rattling inside a too-big body.

Happiness comes easiest when there are things to do, friends to meet, and people to love. I exist to be preoccupied by the bustle of study dates at the bookstore and steamy hotpot in the frosted November air.

When surrounded by the people I love, I am a star that has formed a constellation for astronomers to point their telescopes at; I am complete.

Alone, I feel as if I’m stranded on the far side of the moon.

To clarify, I’m not talking about the childlike fear of getting lost at the grocery store. Or bingeing a new show by myself. Or even spending quiet evenings alone at home. I’m talking about the emptiness that gouges me slowly from within — the feeling of unexplained tears that sharply prod my eyelids when I lay in bed and make shapes of the bumps on the crackly ceiling in desperate attempts to untangle myself. That type of loneliness. Not the fear of not being with other people, but the discomfort of being with myself. Thoughts I do not want to think of surface each time. Why don’t I know what I want? Why can I capture nothing of myself in words on paper or essence in soul? Why do I feel so heartbroken? Where is my peace?

The pale, lonely figure pinned to the sky blinks quietly in answer. Like every other night, I close my eyes to the faraway sound of music and cover this festering sore of mine, until the phone screen finally dims, and darkness envelops all.

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“She sees me drowning in billowing swaths of darkness, ensnared by the crippling thoughts of unspoken regrets and paralyzing fear, and she moves on.”

The numbers on the clock pulse a dim red as the display reads 5:00 a.m.

I sit up in bed, aware that I don’t belong in this secret chamber of time.

When I look out the window, the sun and moon seesaw at each horizon, beginning the process of replacing each other in the sky. I am rooted in the center. In between, I crave the warmth of the sun and fear the cold of the moon. With a hand pressed against the glass, I feel the cool morning air humming outside. For once in my life, I have a desire so intense it rips me out of bed and down the stairs like a madman. Unexplainably vivid emotion guides my body out the door and propels my steps faster and faster. I need to escape.

I find myself running and running and running until my legs scorch like hot stones and the balls of my feet prick push pins with every step until each breath escapes out of me like desperate grasps at a fleeting lifeline.

I don’t know what I’m running towards, but I know I’m running away. I run fueled by frustration over-dependency, over myself, over why I can’t seem to grow up, over WANTING TO LOVE MYSELF ENOUGH TO LOVE SPENDING TIME WITH MYSELF. 84

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“Not the fear of not being with other people, but the discomfort of being with myself.�

“It’s a thought that leaves sweet residues of exuberance and relief, the kind that comes rushing in saccharine tears.”

I stop. My hands clutching the trembling curves of my knees. My chest heaves in, out, in, out, in . . .

I look up. . . . out.

Shades of red, yellow, fleeting rose, and amber illuminate the sprawling sky above. The grey fog that snaked over my shoulders sheds into a brilliant cacophony of color. Swatched across the sky was the most candescent, glorious sunrise sashaying between the criss-cross of pearl-like clouds.

Right now, I am the only person in this world. And I fill up every inch of this silence. I am more alone than ever, but I feel more alive than ever. As the sweat drips down my temples and the muted pain of a dry throat beats in a quick tempo, I can feel myself for the first time — every humming fiber and cell of my being — and I am rising. Rising like the sun.

Can I be enough? I know I don’t want to run with my eyes closed and heart heavy. Perhaps being alone is freeing? It’s a thought that leaves sweet residues of exuberance and relief, the kind that comes rushing in saccharine tears. I walk the long way home instead, down the winding road patterned by golden streams of sunlight; my eyes wide at the irradiated world. I dance underneath a symphony of skies playing just for me. And I am happy.

When night settles once again, and I gravitate towards the questions that slip out uninvited, I place them instead as reminders of where I want to go. I remember the adrenaline that flooded me that morning, and it’s a rushing ravine that I can’t help but wade deeper into. Being alone is exhilarating. Addicting. It pushes me to find myself amidst this mundane preoccupation, and I learn to keep pieces of who I am tucked inside the supple pockets of alone time that I sew. I capture outlines and rough sketches and feel a little less heartbroken when I realize I am more than nothing.

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Sometimes I find myself running too fast, too blindly, just like I did that morning, so I remind myself: slow down, take your time, look up. Think of the warm, honey nostalgia of nights with your mom, and cherish that soft in-between instead of racing against time. Decelerate in orbit for even just a second, and realize that the moon outside isn’t lonely. Realize that she is stable and assured in her solitude.

She is wholly her own.

For me, happiness in solitude is the liberation of cutting my long hair alone underneath the bathroom’s fluorescent lights. It hums with the car engine accompanied by my off-key singing when I drive and triumph over the small this-and-that of everyday life. Happiness lies patiently in the surrounding silence that amplifies my other senses instead: the vivid green swaying of the leaves, the peaceful embrace of the wind, the textured, rough wood of the bleachers that leaves swirled imprints on the bottom of my thighs. Happiness in solitude is absorbing twilight’s serenity instead of filling it with artificial noise. That way, every night, I ride the waves of my billowing thoughts like the free, fierce girl I dream of becoming, and I can almost reach the moon. This is my peace.

Happiness is watching the sun rise and the moon set, and the moon rise and the sun set in never-ending cycles. It is seeing their singular, celestial body reflect my own. Rising and falling, over and over again. To the horizons I go. ■

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dear dead arts

by EUNJAE KIM

Rise from the dead, beloved spirit of the arts, and fill the world once again with your soul and song. layout KELLY KIM photographer GRACE ALEXANDER stylists ANDREA MAURI & JILLIAN SCHWARTZ hmua BASIL MONTEMAYOR & LANE RICE models KRISTEN GUILLEN & JACOB TRAN

I

n the midst of the Renaissance, an artist poured his soul into his palette of colors and whispered a prayer with every stroke of his paintbrush. A poet stepped outside to meet dawn’s chilly embrace, her feet bare and mind eased, drawing inspiration from the distant sun that gleamed like a candle flame in the dark. They shared their art with the world, and the world received them with open arms and lips that whispered praises of their genius. However, when the Renaissance reached its end, the spirit of the arts died with it, leaving artists with only echoes of when they were celebrated by all.

In the last year of the 20th century, I was dressed in my multicolored hanbok to commemorate my first birthday with dol, a Korean tradition. The curious gazes of a hundred guests followed me as I was seated in front of a rosewood table, covered from corner to corner with a collection of trinkets that would foretell my future. Would I pick up a piece of string, which meant a long life? A set of bow and arrows that prophesied my destiny as a warrior? Sticky sweet rice cakes, which symbolized good fortune for eternity?

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from the local stationery shop the night before. It seemed meaningless at the time, a tradition carried out just for fun and tradition’s sake. But, looking back, it seemed to be an early proclamation: I was meant to be a writer.

nies, “my major is English.” I hesitate when I’m asked about my future job plans. When my peers’ expressions shift from curious to disdainful, perhaps even a little mocking, I feel the subtle drop of my shoulders.

It seemed like my destiny was inevitable, a fate etched into stone lifetimes ago by ancient hands, courtesy of my grandma with whom I had spent much of my first six years of life with. Though her limbs were stiff and still as the wooden chair she often sat on, she had a way of spinning beautiful stories and legendary epics out of thin air.

Her infinite imagination was one of the few things left untouched by Parkinson’s, so we built our relationship on storytelling — brick by brick, story by story. She fed me tale after tale, which I absorbed fervorously, always asking for more, more, more, much like a sailor enchanted by the enthralling lull of a siren’s song. She was the Daedalus to my Icarus — my mentor, my inspiration, the one who gifted me the skies — except she kept me sheltered from the sun. My grandma and her stories are what I remember most about my childhood. In truth, they were my childhood.

Initially, I wasn’t sure what had strained my relationship with the arts, but it became painstakingly clearer as time passed. To me, today’s world seems to be one that celebrates numbers.

A world of maths and symbols and formulas and science. A world wanting to go, go, go, and reach beyond the natural realm into something more.

A blur of cold steel, the constant whirr of machines, and dimly lit computer screens reflected on thick-rimmed glasses.

When I flew across the world to America, I was not ready to say goodbye to my muse. However, with her stories, I felt well equipped for my new life; grandma had planted a seed in my spirit that would continue to grow and connect us even when we were apart. I tended to that seed well, watched it sprout and grow, watered it with more stories and words until its roots firmly gripped my heart and spanned across my limbs, intertwining with my veins. It served me well, as it was like a comforting embrace in a lonely country whose sounds I couldn’t make out into words. I loved the arts then, and they seemed to love me back.

I love the arts still, but what once was so pure turned into a rude awakening. I can’t help that every time I introduce myself, there’s a slight smile of embarrassment that always accompa-

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In this newfound chase to discover, the arts appear to be getting left behind in dust and factory exhaust fumes. As buildings pierce the skyline and conglomerates dominate, libraries dwindle; books are kept as dust-collecting decorations, and art is nothing more than a hobby for many.

The language of the machines has become the new currency of communication, while the language of the human tongue seems to be fading in importance. This is perhaps why all creatives ask themselves the same dreaded question: What good am I in a culture that doesn’t see me?

However, it’s times like these when I must once again remind myself that, despite all the factors that seem to be pointing otherwise, we are not so different after all. The sciences are not the only ones improving and powering forward — we are, too. We continue the great legacies of Leonardo da Vinci, Michaelangelo, and so many more through contemporary movements. With the passing years, we find new mediums and fresh insights on life that come with adjusting to an entirely unique time period.

More importantly, both the arts and sciences serve as a means for us to understand the im

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possible puzzle that humanity has been trying to decode since the beginning of time: life itself. Some interpret the complexity of this world through the lens of maths and the sciences, which can complete their logical understanding of the mechanisms of the cosmos, like a final puzzle piece that unveils the big picture. Some interpret it through the arts, finding meaning and beauty in being alive. Who is to say that one is better than the other, especially if they give you a sense of purpose and joy?

For me, the arts are the home I revisit to recover after a long, tiring day. They are a gift given to me by the Heavens — one that allows me to appreciate the life I was given and to form a tight bond with my grandma and other creatives. Through the arts, one soul can show itself raw and unapologetic; to heal others and be healed by others. It is the one thing we can truly call our own, as our arts are carefully crafted with our own experiences, thoughts, and lessons learned. It is our way of presenting our deepest and truest selves to the world, leaving a piece of us behind for the world to remember when we are long gone. There is no right or wrong because to invalidate one’s art is almost to invalidate one’s existence.

If the sciences keep the world moving forward, the arts keep us here in the now, what makes us human through the experience of sharing emotions, stories, and pieces of ourselves. The arts and sciences are yin and yang, the alpha and omega, two flip sides of a coin. One cannot exist without the other, for there is science in art and art in science.

Dear Dead Arts: I breathe life into you once again, just as you have poured life unto me. Breathe again.

Reclaim your power. Live another Renaissance. May you forever paint in color, sing in crescendoing harmony, dance with the flow of poetry and hymns, write with magic and spirit. All things must come to an end, but you live so long as we breathe. ■

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WHEN THE CLOCK STRIKES THIRTEEN

by KAREN XIE

layout JENNIFER JIMENEZ photographer PAIGE MILLER stylists ALEX CAO & SAGE WALKER hmua SARAH STILES model ZION MPEYE

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10 SECONDS TO 12,

AND I THINK OF NOTHING BUT AGE AND ADAGE. SAY, AREN’T WE ALL PAWNS ON TIME’S GREAT CHESSBOARD?

IF ALL THAT WAS WILL ONCE BE LOST, HAVE IT TWICE BEEN LOVED, AND THRICE BEEN TAUGHT. I’VE HEARD THE HOURGLASS IS NO FRIEND TO SECOND CHANCES. 50 SECONDS TO 12, AND I DREAM OF A RACE — THERE IS ME AGAINST CHIMES AND HANDS ON A FACE. RUN, RABBIT, RUN! BUT EVERYTHING’S ALL WRONG — WHAT’S LARGE IS NOW SMALL, AND WE’VE LOST SOMETHING VITAL IN THE MIX OF IT ALL. QUICK, I’M RUNNING OUT OF SAND, BUT PAWNS ARE BOUND BY LINES AND LAWS, AND WE’RE TOO MANY SQUARES FROM WONDERLAND. 10 SECONDS TO 12, AND I SPEAK IN CLICHÉS. ANY LAST WORDS? HOW ABOUT REGRETS? ANYTHING YOU WOULD HAVE DONE A DIFFERENT WAY? THIS PART, I FEAR THE MOST.

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TIME STREAKS BY WITH A DEVIOUS WINK, THERE! THE STRIKE OF 12.

CHECKMATE, I THINK.

BUT THERE’S A BEGINNING IN AN END, FOREVER IS NOTHING BUT AN INTERLUDE. SO WHEN THE CLOCK STRIKES 13 . . .

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Amidst this war on fat bodies, I choose to arm myself with a radical, unconditional love of self and a blatant rejection of fatphobia.

by SOPHIE WYSOCKI

layout JAYCEE JAMISON photographer CAT WILSON stylist MONTSERRAT ELIAS hmua SARA TIN-U model INGRIS PEREIRA

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F

rom the youngest age I can remember, beauty has always been my foremost aspiration. Attached to my notion of beauty has always been the concept of thinness. My best friend tried new diets, losing and gaining back weight, buying new clothes every time the old ones didn’t fit anymore.

Every doll I owned was plastered with the same pink lips, tiny waist, and dainty appendages. I thought I might die if I didn’t embody the symbols of femininity I’d been taught determined my worth.

In the eighth grade, I, along with 200 other gawky preteens, enrolled in P.E. class. We slipped off our individuality and allowed our uniforms, a grey Kealing Middle School T-shirt with athletic shorts, to swallow us whole. We became distinguishable only by the way we looked in these clothes, not by the way we expressed ourselves in clothing or style. Instead of human beings, we shifted into objects to be perceived, to be judged, to be weighed and tested.

A friend I’d known for years transformed into the shapeless, nameless voice of scrutiny.

“Wow, Sophie, you have a BIG butt.”

In that instant, every possible emotion unyieldingly erupted from the volcanic caverns of hormones swirling inside of me and flooded across my unwilling consciousness. I was trapped inside of myself the burden of being perceived was finally upon me. I wished, in that moment and in forevermore, that my body was simply a vessel for my inner self, aiding me in my journey through the world.

I turned 13 years old, had barely grown out of my training bra, and yet the people around me were beginning to behave as though we were adults. As though our bodies were for the consumption of others, as though it was already a necessity to worry about the prospect of being found attractive by another. Uncomfortable in my own skin, I was hyperconscious of the possibility that I could be observed and judged. The thought of breaking the unspoken rules of beauty caused me great terror; I envisioned myself a social pariah for life, ostracized by my repulsing, odious form. My body was no longer just carrying me - it was a mask I wore, one that would determine my worth. Perfecting my mask was, for so long, more important to me than expressing anything I hid underneath it.

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“I finally found what I had needed to see all along: people who were happy, loved, and thriving without the condition of “ In a world where self-confidence is so antagonized, valuing oneself unconditionally is a

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Growing older, I became obsessed with the weight I continued to gain. The number on the scale ceaselessly grew, quantifying the distance I was growing away from the body type I’d been taught to desire. I was maturing, growing out of the child’s body I had lived in for so long, and becoming a young woman. It was unfathomable that I was getting bigger; my body refused to fit the petite, childlike ideal that had been pushed upon me. It refused my deepest desires. Instead of feeling proud of my burgeoning womanhood and the faithful body that came with it, I wondered why I continued to grow in size while others remained skinny, small, and, in my eyes, perfect. Comments on social media, fatphobic remarks in movies and television shows, and even the words boys my age used to describe girls’ bodies behind their backs bombarded me ruthlessly, scraping bits and pieces of me away until I felt like a shell of the girl I used to be.

Somehow, I wasn’t defeated yet. With the last ounce of strength and love that fueled the pulsing of my heartbeat, I made a choice. I didn’t want to break down in front of the mirror any longer - no more teary eyes on the school bus, no more shrinking in futile attempts to hide my body. I wanted more, a better life for myself than being constantly concerned with what others thought of me. Through social media, I discovered a scattered but immensely powerful movement advocating for body positivity. All bodies are beautiful, size does not determine beauty, and other phrases encouraging self-love and self-care ran over and over in my head. I began trying to condition myself to believe in myself the way these other women were choosing to. Instead of falling apart, I stood tall. I tried to believe that I was beautiful the way I was, and I continued on.

As much as I wanted to believe in this movement and the power of positive thinking, I found it nearly impossible to recondition the way I thought. I couldn’t relate to the ultra-toned and ultrafeminine faces of this movement. Plus-sized models like Ashley Graham or Iskra Lawrence were beautiful, and I wanted to be just like them, but their bodies became yet another unreachable ex-

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pectation that I held myself to. Because of their beauty, I saw within them this inherent worth, strength, and value that I failed to attribute to myself. Each passing day, I would wake up and walk to the bathroom.

My bedhead, acne scars, and sweats caused a visceral reaction of disgust in me. I felt as though in order to be a valuable fat person, I needed to work tirelessly to be the embodiment of beauty and femininity. I would wake up two hours before I needed to, put on a full face of makeup, straighten and curl my unruly hair, wear a constricting and cinching outfit to contort my excess flesh into the correct shape. Pain is beauty - or so I told myself. I expected perfection all the time, and when I couldn’t meet the impossible standards I set myself to, I failed myself.

Despite the honorable intentions of the body positivity movement, its ultimate effect was proving to me how important beauty is as a standard for value in our society. My outlook on self-love eventually began to improve when I started seeing people who looked more like me on social media. Everyday people, fat folks of all genders, ethereal queer and trans human beings danced across my screen and proclaimed their love of self despite any and all normative expectations. They refused to fit any constrictive mold of beauty, gender, or sexuality, denouncing the idea that they had to be anything other than themselves to be valued. I finally found what I had needed to see all along: people who were happy, loved, and thriving without the condition of beauty.

At my heaviest weight, I have begun dismissing society’s notion of beauty as value and reconstructing how I think about fat bodies, thin bodies, and my body. I’ve

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decided that my whole self is valuable and worthy of unconditional love, acceptance, and care, regardless of what I look like. Bodies don’t have to be beautiful to be meaningful, respected, and deserving of tenderness - we are all inherently valuable just by being people. In a world where self-confidence is so antagonized, valuing oneself unconditionally is a radical act. It hasn’t been easy; in fact, unlearning the fatphobia so deeply embedded in our culture has been made deliberately difficult. Moving forward, it won’t be any easier, but I have chosen to fight for myself and for other individuals that deserve liberation.

There isn’t a step-bystep guide to achieving self-love, but it is a practice that we have to commit ourselves to each day.

Not every day will be a good day, progress will not be linear, but I believe that a sustained devotion to this principle of radical self-acceptance will change my life for the better. In doing so, I accept this undeniable truth: fat people are beautiful, fat people are sexy, fat people are precious, but more than any of those things, fat people are valuable and important.

Now, it is my turn to wear what I want, refuse to harmfully restrict my eating, take up space, and shout my love for myself from the rooftops. We cannot choose how we are conditioned to think, and we cannot change the fatphobia ingrained in our brains. What we can choose is how we react to it and what we pass on to our family, friends, and our children. Right now, I choose to love them, value them, and hold them dear no matter what they look like. As I join the fight against fatphobia, I stretch out my chubby hands to meet yours. I hope you take them and join me. ■

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THE INESSENTIAL WORKER

by ELIZA PILLSBURY layout ADRIANA TORRES photographer KATIE PANGBORN stylist GIGI FEINGOLD & MADEE FELTNER hmua SARA TIN-U model DANAE RIVERS

SELF-PROMOTION, AND SELF-IMAGE BLUR EVEN

OF WORKPLACE CULTURE DISAPPEAR.

THE DISTINCTIONS BETWEEN SELF-HELP,

FURTHER AS THE PREDICTABLE STANDARDS

INSTANT MESSAGE APRIL 2, 2020, 8:52 A.M.: My skin looks so good after giving it a break from makeup during the six months of quarantine. I’ve also grown out my bangs and invested my stimulus check in a new wardrobe of luxury sweatsuits. Have you heard of the Chloe Ting Challenge? I completed it over the summer.

Twice. I also lost a lot of weight from going on quarantine walks with my family. When I moved back home, we literally never argued. Our familial relationship is just so healthy. Like my skin. Have I mentioned my glowing, dewy skin?

I INSTANT MESSAGE APRIL25, 2, 2020, 2020, 8:52 skin looks so MAY 2:45A.M.: P.M.:My I recently redecgood after giving it a breaksetup. from Turns makeup orated my work-from-home out, six months of quarantine.

Iduring have athe knack for interior design! And I’ve my also grown out my bangs and my mom and I taught ourselves howinvested to garden! stimulus check in a new wardrobe of luxury It’s actually so easy. Now I can make my own sweatsuits. Have you heard of the Chloe Ting basil pesto to put on fresh, homemade pasta.

Challenge? I completed it over the summer.

A healthy lifestyle theofkey to a from healthy life.

Twice.

I also lost aislot weight going I’ve also started taking multivitamins with on quarantine walks with my family. When my collagen supplements. supposed to I moved back home, weI’mliterally never go to a destination wedding next month, so argued. Our familial relationship is just Ihealthy. can’t afford to waste time off on sick days.

Like my skin. Have I mentioned my glowing, dewy skin?

wish working from home looked like bedazzled barrettes, Zoom-calling from Cabo, and newly defined washboard abs framed by a silk pajama set. But failed productivity is not glamorous. Relaxation is a privilege. I’m grateful that my family and I emerged from quarantine mostly unscathed, though my posture and eyesight deteriorated after all the time spent in online summer school, bingeing Netflix, or doom-scrolling through Twitter just to feel something. But not everyone was so lucky.

I was far from the frontlines, among the inessential workers from home. We tried to make the best of it, or at least as best we could. Lacking substantive connections, either virtual or distanced, we obsessively turned inward: “Take advantage of the time, and bake enough homemade sourdough to forget.” We discovered which of our friends owned summer homes. The salons shuttered, so we dyed our hair over the bathtub past midnight. Questionable decisions were no longer questioned. Healthy coping mechanisms were a fever dream; we took our temperature twice a day.

With no other outlet than social media, this summer’s stultified self-improvement was no longer for my own sake. If reinvention didn’t have some outward manifestation, it was hardly even worth it. Epiphanies became currency, exchanged for likes and virality — the kind that could land you on the “Today Show,” not the Intensive Care Unit. The distinctions between self-help, self-promotion, and self-image blurred into muddled nothingness.

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I wanted to emerge from quarantine unrecognizable, shedding scaly skin, and a few dozen pounds. Instead, my stress acne was never worse, and I spent my days picking my face and snacking until it turned five o’clock somewhere. I read Coleridge and Austen to reclaim my time’s lost value: “Water, water, everywhere and not a drop to drink.” Among endless hours of boredom, somehow, there still was not a second to spare.

Valuable according to whom? The same Productivity Gods who decide whether an experience is wasted or not? Or rather myself, who subscribes to such arbitrary standards of work, work-life balance, work uniform? Well, those standards have gone out the same window that I now keep open to increase ventilation of potentially infectious aerosols.

INSTANT MESSAGE AUGUST 10, 2020, 11:14 P.M.: I’m in a committed relationship with my Google Calendar and the “Touch up my appearance” filter on Zoom. Eyelash extensions are my new addiction. Have you downloaded iOS 14 yet?

I spent all of last night color-coordinating my homescreen widgets and my GCal aesthetic.

My screen time is going to be disastrous this week! And there’s a fall sale at Free People that’s going to destroy my budget! What can I say? First, I am feminine. More importantly, I am productive. The two are inextricable.

In the ‘before times,’ I harbored a perhaps irrational hatred of makeup, but lately, I can’t escape the image of my face on a screen. I feel an unwelcome pressure to look presentable for my professor and peers. The pressure is self-inflicted; I’m already insecure, and I don’t want people who have never met me in-person to associate my participation in class with tragic undereye circles. Even if I don’t have time to brush my teeth before rolling out of bed, I never forget to fill in my brows.

“THE NEW UNIFORM IS PROFESSIONAL ON TOP, PAJAMAS ON THE BOTTOM. I NEVER DRESS UP TO MAKE MYSELF FEEL MORE PUT TOGETHER — RATHER, TO FOOL OTHERS INTO THINKING I AM.” 116

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INSTANT MESSAGE OCTOBER 16, 4:59 P.M.: I’ve started working outside more than in my bed. It’s good for the skin and the soul! The pandemic has become a lame excuse more than a legitimate inhibiting factor. Deadlines come and go, the wind blows a cold front through the city. Do I have a cold, or is it finally COVID, come to get me? There’s no consensus, no sense of collective security, or lack thereof.

My three month free trial of that guided meditation app is about to expire. But I heard there’s a vaccine coming soon! Maybe then we can go back to normal, or maybe there’s just no going back.

If I usually bought jeans and sneakers at the beginning of the school year, this time, I invested in sweatpants and comfortable tops and T-shirts. I stockpiled dry shampoo, a commodity more valuable to me than all the sold-out toilet paper in the world. The new uniform is professional on top, pajamas on the bottom. I never dress up to make myself feel more put together — rather, to fool others into thinking I am.

Despite these self-conscious compulsions, I’m ashamed to spend so much time on myself when the pandemic has left so many behind: “Kim, there’s people that are dying.” Working parents, teachers, students, and artists of all kinds, not to mention nearly 235,000 American casualties as of November. Unrealistic expectations, whether for reopening the economy or making quota at work, are not simply unsustainable but sometimes actively harmful. And I wonder, where we are supposed to go — to heal — from here? From my hometown bedroom to a viral hotspot? To a changing work environment, one that’s more compatible with a weary workforce? Probably not. ■

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MOON

N I G O HT T

E

W A T S H I

A transient moment where human form is lost.

by AMBER WEIR

layout MARLEY CRAWFORD

"The mind and body are inherently linked, each one serving to reinforce the other."

I

feel revitalized when alone in the ocean, watch- can find peace in the stillness of a flower reflecting ing the endless cycles of water ripple and crash the stillness within yourself. upon the shore. An overwhelming feeling of insignificance pours through me as I stare into the The distractions from day to day life can keep the endless horizon of the cool, shimmering, blue wa- mind busy as thoughts stream in and out of the ter. There is no end in sight — I feel minuscule, like brain. The brain itself is complex and contains a speck of dust. Still, the surroundings feel alive and what is known as an ego inside it. The ego is a remind me of myself: a continuous conglomerate psychological term that refers to where you file of interconnected strands of veins, blood, muscles, memories, feelings, and emotions. When the ego energy, life. For a few seconds, I am overcome with takes control of your mind, you lose consciousness, peace as I enter the realms of the formless. I am a or awareness, by becoming detached from reality. ball of energy, with no thoughts, no feelings, and We can lose the present moment when dwelling no attachment to my identity as a human. over events in the past or fixating on future ones.

The easiest shortcut to recognizing the activation Just as I am in a daze, enthralled by the beauty of of ego is when you begin to think about “I” or “me” the ocean, the ephemeral moment of formlessness because it is when you start identifying objects, is lost. I am brought back to smelling the fresh people, and events with yourself. You become an sea-salt, feeling the seaweed wrap between my individual, rather than a small part of the universe. toes, and seeing the small bubbles from the fish swimming beneath me. I am no longer a higher Egos are hungry and parasitic, capitalizing off consciousness in a human vessel, but a body that's negativity in order to sustain itself; the ego is also occupying a brain. never satisfied and will always crave more, causing you to overthink. While it is true that thinking is These rare moments where individuals are con- a natural process, we are not the voice inside our sumed by nature and recognize how small they are head. The mind and body are inherently linked, in comparison to the natural world have been de- each one serving to reinforce the other. scribed as the sublime. Understanding the sublime with words alone is futile; it can only be known Think of every thought as a little seed that plants through experience. Thinking and labeling objects itself within the body. The seed will begin to grow prevent individuals from encountering the sub- and travel through the body. On this journey, the lime because the moment is lost when describing seed changes the chemicals in your body, such as something for what it is, rather than how it makes your hormones, mood, and blood levels. A positive you feel. thought forms good energy and can act as a catalyst, making you feel light and airy. Meanwhile, a Take an ethereal flower: Are you feeling the energy negative or unresolved thought can form a huge radiated from each fragile petal, or are you just la- knot of muscle or a clot, leaving you drained or beling it as “flower”? While you don’t need to look achy. Most modern medicine treats the symptoms and examine the intricate detail of a flower every of headaches, hypertension, or high blood presmorning on the way to work, when you do, you sure in the body — but not the root cause. These

medical problems can sometimes be attributed to stress and negativity within the mind.

Awareness of the mind-body connection allows us to understand ourselves on a deeper level. Eckhart Tolle coined the phrase “pain-body” to describe the concept of the mind forcing you to relieve pain in response to an external stimulus; this could be a scent, sound, name, event, or person. The pain-body lies dormant in all of us until triggered and usually is derived from ego identification.

Music, for example, is a very powerful tool, which can transport you back to the past. My Grandad’s favorite singer was Frank Sinatra, and sometimes, when I’m out in public, one of Sinatra’s songs will play in the background. It catches me by surprise and transports me back to when he bought an iPod. I spent the afternoon with him, downloading all his favorite music.

Frank Sinatra triggers my pain-body to an extent because I am reminded of my Grandad’s death. But, it also brings back so many beautiful memories of the times we shared. Emotions will always be there waiting for you, but you have agency in how we deal with them. Choosing to accept emotions and allowing them to run through you can prevent the build-up of negativity within the mind and body over a prolonged period of time.

“While I stood looking at the moon, I got pins and needles running through my foot.”

Still, it is not always easy to let go of events, es- Sometimes, thinking about how complicated pecially if something is beyond your control. nature is can be tiresome and overwhelming beWhen I am stressed, my back becomes a breed- cause there are no definite answers. Yet, simuling ground for knots and tightness. Sometimes, taneously, it is amazing to be able to appreciate it takes until I stretch or take a yoga class to the mystique of our world and understand that even realize the immense strain on my body. Yet, some things do not need meaning; they just are. when I use force on the knots, I feel the negativity leave my body, and my mind becomes at ease. While I stood looking at the moon, I got pins Now, when I feel stressed about something I and needles running through my foot. I felt the have no control over, I think, “Is this affecting nerves twitch and pulse through the heel of my me in the current moment?” The answer is of- foot and the sensation of my whole leg going ten no. If it’s in the past, then why let it ruin the numb. During this moment, I gained a degree of present? Life becomes smoother when you stop consciousness — presence — and enjoyed being expecting things to happen and just let things alive. I thought about the symbiotic relationship between the moon and the waves and the symbe. biotic relationship between my mind and body.

Tonight l saw a full moon. Although it looked We can’t look at our lives in isolation from the cool, I felt a sense of warmth from the light it natural world or view our identity as only our omitted. Ever since I was young, I have been thoughts. Nature is within us, just as we are one fascinated by the moon; I used to think it was with nature. following me home when I was in the car. I find a sense of comfort from the fact that while life When life seems to be spiraling, draw attention can be uncertain, the moon will always be there. to your pulse and breathing. Feel the momentary bliss of the formless and remember you are The moon is special but also paramount to our not a body occupying a brain but a higher conlife on Earth as it controls the tide of the waves. sciousness in the body of a human. ■

WHITE SILK DRESS | Stardust Vintage WHITE BLOUSE | Revival Vintage GOLD BUCKLE BELT | Revival Vintage GOLD CHOKER | Revival Vintage GOLD WIRE CHOKER | Revival Vintage

When my father wasn’t losing me, I was chasing after him. I think the poets call that γλυκύπικρον. Sweet-bitter.

juno slept here.

by KELLY WEI

layout CHIARA BOYE & XANDRIA HERNANDEZ photographer ALYSSA OLVERA stylists JOSEANE TEJADA & ESTHER DASHEVSKY hmuas AMBER BRAY & JANE LEE models LILY JAQUES, RODRIGO COLUNGA PASTRANA & MARIE BENNETT

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n Rome, you can’t go two blocks without running into the shadow of God.

When my father took me to Europe for the first time, I was 17 years old and angry with him. We arrived in Italy in mid-July, and by then, had already walked through many of the great Romantic cities, making our way along the Mediterranean waterfront — all the while speaking, I remember, very little to each other.

I noticed the piety of southern Europe early on. In every city we visited, amidst the blur of galleries and museums, main streets full of tourists and back alleys where bar owners stepped out to smoke, churches became baseline buildings. My father and I visited a number of them — La Sagrada Familia, Duomo di Firenze, St. Peter’s Basilica, and at last, the Pantheon, where I had stood miserably in the faint circle of light beaming from above, through the oculus, and looked up.

Everything was beautiful, and it cracked my heart in two. I think the poets call that γλυκύπικρον.

Sweet-bitter.

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“When my father wasn’t losing me, Broadly, I was angry with my father because he left and never really came back. That summer, however, I was specifically angry because he had a habit of, literally, leaving me behind.

It was hot, and bus fares were cheap, but my father and I agreed that the best way to experience the cities was to walk through them. I meandered and stalled, intensely observant of the sun-baked streets, the quaint cafes, and the old couples in the park.

My father, by contrast, strode on with urgent purpose and a 20-page itinerary in hand, looking for grander and more important things to show me.

Our first day in Europe, he lost me in a crowded Spanish square after I had stopped to listen to the music. When the man in the street finished his song, I’d applauded and turned to my father, only to find him gone. I had no money, no phone service, and only a handful of Spanish phrases I’d picked up from school. When I found him half an hour later, he only blinked at me, perhaps never noticing I was gone at all.

Variations of this instance happened

over and over again: in museum halls, in grocery stores, in the labyrinthine streets of every city we visited. When my father wasn’t losing me, I was chasing after him, knuckles white on the hem of my sundress as I kept my eye on the shape of his shrinking back.

Him and I, forever 10 paces apart — and in non-physical metrics, probably further than that.

Up until I was in high school, my father would fly down from Boston to see me once or twice a year. He’d book a hotel, we’d see a movie, and I’d accompany him to the Chinatown barber. Then he’d leave again on Sunday morning, dropping me off at the Blockbuster for Mom to pick me up.

When I was really young, he told me strange bedtime stories — mythologically intertwining real people I knew with characters he invented. None of it made sense, but I listened raptly all the same. I liked his voice because, more often, he was quiet. Quiet in the corner of the hotel room where he worked on his laptop, quiet in the car, and quiet for months stretching into years as I grew into a young woman, out of his sight.

I was chasing after him” amuse-bouche

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In the Pantheon of Rome, following our guided tour, my father and I once again dispersed from one another; him to scope out the exhibitions and admire the technical architecture, me to walk in listless circles and slouch in the pews, unspeakably sad.

Unspeakably, because I was too scared to be anything but angry out loud. All summer long, I’d trailed after him, biting down hard on things I knew better than to say. Dad, slow down. Dad, can we just sit? Dad, tell me another story. To suggest I felt something more than resentment was to admit that I wanted a biological father after all — and want was the most shameful feeling of all. But I did.

I desperately wanted this man to turn around and come back for me. Just once, I wanted it to be different.

There is an opening at the highest point of the Pantheon dome, where the light comes in soft and wide. I hadn’t meant to move toward that circle of light, pooling on the marble floor from above, but I did. Like something from Heaven, the sun set the tone for the rest of the temple, washing its floors and columns in warm shadows.

me of myself. Maybe he was thinking about Rome, too, and the impossibility of religion. Maybe he had come to stand next to me because he’d been wanting to all summer, or even longer, but didn’t quite know how. Just like me.

“It’s beautiful,” I said impulsively. “Sometimes it’s all so beautiful I want to cry. Does that make sense?”

Even the most rational generals of Rome made tributes to Mars: men would cast their sacrifices into fires on the eve of battle, blood dripping from hands and altars, and sing hymns in a bid for glory.

King Agamemnon had sent his only daughter into the flames to appease Artemis, believing she would change the winds and allow his men to sail for Troy.

Such acts of insanity, but we do it — for deities whose presences in our lives we can never be sure of and whose capricious natures forever elude us. If you never see God, and He never sees you, is your religion real? If I could never catch up to my father, and he could never turn around to see me, was I his daughter in any sense of the word? Or was that mythology, too?

My father looked over at me, and I couldn’t explain the expression on his face, only that I’d never seen it before. It was subtle, like all other facets of his character, but I thought he seemed taken aback.

Struck.

How could men have made such a thing? The Pantheon was a beautiful and exemplary feat of architecture — but it was also surreal to me that an empire could toil at building something of such grandeur and awe for years, all in the name of silent “Yes,” he said, after a pause. “It does.” deities. How could you know any of it was real?

Gods you couldn’t see, creatures out of your control Why do we believe? In divinity, in love, in fathers — what sort of masochist pledged his devotion to — in anything at all? Why do the pious, but the sad such forces? and broken, too, come to places where Venus sings, and Juno sleeps? Pleading, fearing, seeking, weeping.

“Oh, there you are.”

Laughing, watching, waiting. Waiting for God? For the line to go through?

Religion encourages humanity to bare its best and worst faces, and the elaborate sites we construct in I don’t know. But I am drawn to all of it. the name of our gods are testaments to their hold over us, believer or not. Whether we want to believe When you leave these places, something follows or not. you out the door. It’ll wash away if you aren’t welcome to it, sapped back into the otherworld My father stepped into the circle with me, blasé from whence it came. But if like me, you are the sort and understated. Most times, I could hardly believe of person who chooses to believe in it, you might we were related. He was a physicist with a doctoral invite the feeling to linger, to nest, and to affirm degree in data science. I was a moody American what we all secretly hope to hear: teenager who read Anne Sexton. But something in the way he looked up at the oculus reminded All will be clear. All will be seen. ■

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“When you leave these places,

something follows you out the door.� amuse-bouche

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THE FUTURE IS

NOW! NOW! NOW! NOW!

by KAREN XIE

But wait, there’s more … or so they say.

layout KELLY KIM photographer JESUS DEL REAL stylists ALEX CAO & ELLA HERNANDEZ hmua ZIMEI CHEN & JESSI DELFINO models RICKY MARTINEZ & NICOLE RUDAKOVA

"A Greater Wonder than Aladdin’s Lamp, press the button and there’s your station . . . ” Zenith Radio, 1939

I

hear adverts like these in a particular voice — that tinny, white-man drawl, booming through speakers with deep charm. He lauds toothy smiles and croons of glorious Manifest Destiny. Oh invention! Innovation! Symphonies of bigger, better, faster, now, march towards inevitable biggest, best, fastest . . . but what of now?

What is sooner than now? Let him tell you. He was the catalyst, it is only right. Let him tell the sordid tale of maniacal progress. Let him cry, “The Future is Now!”

“The Modern Miracle!”

- Meadows

Select - A - Speed Washing Machine, 1950

In May of 1950, Ray Bradbury prophesized our untimely demise. At the end stands a lone house in sunny California, cheerfully warbling: “Tick-tock, seven o’clock, time to get up, time to get up!” The house will sing to wake an apathetic crowd, stamped away by nuclear war (no one gets up). She will remind of utility bills in the morning and draw hot baths at night. The bath will turn tepid, the bills will remain unpaid, and she’ll continue to sing for only the winds and the wild. Spectacular automation has become mere futility, but what does she know?

In May of 2020, this house has a name — Alexa, Google, or maybe Siri — and she knows far too much. Utility bill reminders are elementary. This new sentient being recognizes our voices, purchases, patterns, and uses them to sell more, recommend more, generate more of those terrifying Facebook ads. She knows us better than we know ourselves, and she is always listening.

At the end, the house lays among rubble and ruin and sings “Today is August 5, 2026 . . .” Ray Bradbury predicts the world will end in six years time, but not by chance, no — we will do it ourselves. Our technology will no more outlive us than it will destroy us, and at this rate, I wouldn’t be surprised. Set the timer. Let the countdown begin.

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tick.

TICK TICK

TICK

Technology used to be auxiliary. In the 1900s, we created the refrigerator to keep our food fresh, the washing machine to replace hours of scrubbing, and actually — the repercussions were good! At the start of the century, five percent of married women had jobs. By 1980, that number jumped to 51 percent.

The household technology had become an engine of liberation!

But what is liberation now? Is it replacing snail mail with email, delay with immediacy, only to replace carefully penned musings with half-conscious taps on a screen? Today, we expect promptness, and we expect it yesterday. Look to Amazon Prime for proof. Look to the anxious spouses, bosses, or mothers — a text unsent within a foot tap and a half is impertinent, even worrisome. Unburdening has turned to burden. Deliberation has become delivery.

Is this liberation?

The world has run out of patience, I presume.

Even the clock hands spin faster.

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TICK

TI

TICK

ICK

K

TICK TICK TICK

TICK

TICK TICK TICK

TICK

TIC

CLICK CLICK CLICK CLICK CLICK CLICK CLICK CLICK

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CLICK

CLICK CLICK

CLICK spark

CLICK

“Introducing the Apple II, the home computer that’s ready to work, play, and grow with you.” - Apple, 1977

K CLICK

Sometimes, it strikes me that we have the entire world tucked neatly in our hands, yet, we choose to scroll . . . Sometimes, when I no longer wish to think, I type “netflix.com” into the search bar, and I blank with recognized relief. I won’t need to muster a single ounce of energy for the next four, five, or sixty minutes. “The Office” jingle plays, and I breathe a bit of my life out into thin air. click.

Technology now consumes us. In 2019, the average teen spent more than 7 hours of their day looking at a screen — that’s half of our waking hours, viewed through pixels. Half of our conscious lives have melded into some pale imitation of waking reality, and it seems we are okay with it. This statistic was also pre-pandemic. We now hold classes and meetings and game nights galore on those screens . . . technology hasn’t just consumed us, it

controls us, and we are nothing without it. I’d like to set an alarm to wake us out of this trance — let me grab my phone.

They call this the new norm, but that’s a part of the problem too. Within a year, we have normalized the premise of “Wall-E” — he is knocking on our front door. Perhaps it was necessary, but it came too easily. I wonder if Andrew Stanton is disappointed that we turned his dystopian warning into grim reality.

Look, my quarrel is not with the almighty screen itself — my quarrel is with our loss of self. Technology evokes passivity. “Sit back and enjoy” removes an element of effort from humanity in which we no longer have to work to stay in touch with the world. “The Office” will just play — I know. Yes, technology evokes staticity. It adds balm to the touch, mutes speech into rings, and shaves the peaks and valleys of exhilarating time into rolling waves of static. I turn on technology when I no longer wish to think.

When was the last time you felt truly alive?

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“She’s on the moon right now.

Where will technology take you?” - Dell Technology, 2020 I feel as though some primeval force is stirring, and he too will be made of the metaphysical, some binary entity of 0s and 1s. Rusty boxes of scrap and tin robot are distant memories — artificial intelligence is too vain for that, and we should know. We created him.

He bears no physical resemblance to the Frankenstein creatures of lore, but Mary Shelley had a point. How can we create life and deign to model it after us when we don’t even know what makes us, us? This mystery of humanity is where both miracle and danger reside, but what if there’s not enough room for two?

But forget about that for now. Escapism is human, that’s for sure, and the big thinkers of today have capitalized on this. Virtual reality is here! And it is unfettered flight, a shuttle to the moon. I don’t doubt its utility, and I praise its virtues, but I fear the day life becomes an app store package, purchased from some nebulous cloud. Wall-E is knocking again.

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I feel as though the Earth is spinning faster with those clock hands, and there has to be some side-effect. I’m reminded of my record player, spinning even after the melody has died to scratches. It’s funny — I originally bought it to decelerate, whisk me back to the peacock blue days of Sinatra and Fitzgerald, yet I’ve found I get annoyed that I have to flip the disc once the music has died — Spotify just does it for me. The trumpets and tubas and great french horns come and go, but the record keeps on spinning. One day, Spotify will play what we want to hear before we know it ourselves.

The Earth keeps on spinning and spinning and spinning.

Today is December 5, 2020.

There are five and a half years left on the timer, and precursory alarms mean nothing to us. So spin on, clock hands. They say the future is now — but then what comes tomorrow?

The advert man is eerily silent, for the house has begun to sing.■

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T T T

THEY SAY THE FUTURE IS NOW THEY SAY THE FUTURE IS NOW THEY SAY THE FUTURE IS NOW

— — —

BUT THEN WHAT COMES TOMORROW? BUT THEN WHAT COMES TOMORROW? BUT THEN WHAT COMES TOMORROW?

my mama's muumuu

You don’t have to worry about placing names or anything for now since this is just practice!

Just make sure to incorporate it in your title spread! You’re free to change the color but you cant mess with font size or the order.

by MEGAN SHEN layout MICHELLE COLLINS photographer SHREEJWAL DHAKAL stylist MADDIE SIEDELL hmua JESSI DELFINO models CHLOE BOGEN & CLARA ELENES

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Everyone has insecurities. Mine manifested in a muumuu.

This will be the ‘blurb’ / headline you will be using! Make sure this is also included in the title spread.

You’re free to mess around with font choice, size and placement!

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t’s 2006. You’re in kindergarten. Mother’s Day is just around the corner, and we need a messilydone, but well-meaning arts & crafts gift, stat.

The mission: color this paper doll cutout in the likeness of your mom or die trying. You have access to the four Crayola markers in front of you, but if absolutely necessary, you may bargain with Phoebe for a fifth one.

You’ve decided to don your paper cutout mother in your real mother’s signature look — her rainbow muumuu. The real muumuu has dull colors that look like the knockoff version of Roy G. Biv; there’s no yellow, no violet, but for some reason, there’s pink.

No matter. With only four colors, we’re going to have to take some artistic liberties. A streak of Cerulean creates a stubborn dress-shaped border.

Clammy kindergarten fingers stain the paper with stripes of Mango Tango and Brick Red. A few lines of Pink Flamingo (you begged Phoebe for it) have been added for historical accuracy. Finally, Green Yellow will be used to fill in the blanks.

Step back, admire your work. It’s hard being a genius.

But not everyone has your artistic vision. The teacher circles the tables, surveying each student’s progress. She stops at your desk and picks up your masterpiece with an amused smile. “Look here, class,” she says. “Look at how colorful her drawing is!” The class giggles in a giddy, knowing way. Then, addressing you, she asks, “Your mom wears dresses like this?”

Your mom wears dresses like this?

Your mom wears dresses like this?

Yes, she does.

That’s what you want to say. Well, that’s what I

wanted to say. But I was six years old, and at first, I was confused. Then embarrassed. Then ashamed.

I felt like I just revealed a dirty secret. Hey guys, my mom wears this big, ugly muumuu to sleep! Every single night!

It’s funny how easily pride can turn into humiliation.

I don’t really remember how I responded. Maybe with a quiet “yes,” or maybe with nothing at all. I assume everyone just went back to coloring their paper moms. But my own paper doll, once a source of pride, now stared back at me, mockingly. Now I was stuck with this loud, boisterous, ugly dress.

What started as a simple attempt at recreation had morphed into an exposing reveal of my, apparently embarrassing, home life.

"But the warmth of my mother’s love wouldn’t do well against the chill of the outside world. And in my juvenile attempt at likeness, I had left her in the cold."

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Amidst my peers’ stifled laughs, I was immediately overcome with humiliation, and I latched onto the closest source of comfort. The dress. Suddenly, this wasn’t just some muumuu. It was my mama’s muumuu.

It was safety, it was reassurance, it was unconditional love. But the warmth of my mother’s love wouldn’t do well against the chill of the outside world. And in my juvenile attempt at likeness, I had left her in the cold.

Sorry, Mama.

Now, at 21, I find that I’m much more indignant about the situation. At the time, the whole ordeal proceeded in a much quieter, shamefaced sort of way. I didn’t cry on the way home or yell at my mom for wearing ugly clothes. I just went about my regular, six-year-old life.

And yet, it’s been almost 15 years now, and I still can’t shake the memory of that day — of the slow realization that this was something I should’ve kept private.

When the source of your embarrassment is also a source of comfort, there’s a strange tension that forms.

For me, the muumuu represented warmth, tenderness, home. But it was also a symbol of ridicule, a constant reminder that society was not as forgiving as my loved ones.

From then on, fashion became an intensely personal matter. The muumuu incident had espoused in me a deep fear of how others perceived not just me, but my family. There was a definitive line between “home” and “outside,” and my appearance was a crucial element in creating that line. This shirt is for lounging at home, only. These pants should only be worn around immediate family. Don’t wear that pair of glasses in public.

Comfort and beauty were mutually exclusive, and if there was an article of clothing that I genuinely cherished, I deemed it unsuitable for the outside world.

It isn't uncommon to have that dorky pair of pajamas that you only wear at home or a stain-ridden sweat

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"The gnawing burden of the muumuu was one harbored only by me, and although I have known that all my life, realizing it at that moment set me free."

shirt reserved specifically for rainy days. Objectively, I knew that it was completely normal to have a different set of clothes for “outside” and for home. But I still couldn't shake the anxiety and shame centered around the internalized line I had created. Again, I thought of the muumuu.

I decided to confront the matron herself. Over FaceTime and dinner, I asked my mother if she remembered the muumuu from my childhood.

“Huh?” She said between bites. “Oh yeah, that dress. Very big. Pink stripes.”

And that was it. The dress that has plagued my mind since kindergarten was barely worth two sentences in my mother’s memory. In a way, it was enlightening. For me, the muumuu had become an ever-present reminder of my foolishness, an unwavering incarnation of my insecurities. For my mother, it would take much more to elicit that kind of reaction. For her, even the repeated coaxing of Don’t you remember wearing this every day? would only induce a sympathetic, “Oh ... I did, didn’t I?” My mother’s response was an unexpected antidote. Her indifference washed over me, and I was finally able to see the incident in a new light.

There was no need for guilt, no need for shame — not when the person, so inextricably linked to the dress, barely remembered it. The gnawing burden of the muumuu was one harbored only by me, and although I have known that all my life, realizing it at that moment set me free.

A few days later, my mother sent me a picture of the muumuu. Like The Ghost of Christmas Past, the photo immediately immersed me in that alltoo-familiar preadolescent shame. But at twentyone, I see it with fresh eyes. The muumuu was paler than I remember. Quieter. It wasn’t the scandalous family secret that my younger self had made it out to be. It was just a muumuu.

I think back to that Mother’s Day, to the moment before my teacher held up my drawing. To my previous self, the muumuu was simply an object that I associated with my mother. Nothing more, nothing less. In my resentful hindsight, it was me who created unnecessary baggage, me who clung to a glorified narrative of a sentimental keepsake. But seeing that photo, I was reminded of how I was before. There was a childhood innocence, an obliviousness that exempted me from the shackles of self-doubt and insecurity. I miss that.

In my humiliation, I felt ostracized and alone. I wanted nothing more than to blend back into the crowd. But the reality is that there will inevitably be moments where someone judges something you treasure. I don’t want to fear those moments anymore. At least not over a piece of clothing.

I’ve always been an overthinker. I brood over the slightest interactions, and I stay up at night thinking about things I could’ve done differently.

But I’m alright with letting this one go. Letting go of the baggage, of the embarrassment, of the fear. Letting go of my mama’s muumuu. ■

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e e M t Ja

erv e y , eH n In the past five years, Jane Claire founded #bossbabesatx, ran a boutique creative studio, and produced her first EP, “Sour Grapefruit.” But why did it take a pandemic for her to feel like she’s really ‘made it’?

Austin’s beloved creative opens up about anxiety, change, and (not) doing it all.

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the big sister you wish you had.

by EUNICE BAO

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layout MARLEY CRAWFORD photographer SHUER ZHUO stylists ALEX CAO & CALEB ZHANG hmua CARMELA URDANETA model JANE HERVEY

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J

ane Claire Hervey wears many hats, and I’m not just referring to the iconic red cowboy hat she wears on stage. She’s an entrepreneur, former “American Idol” contestant, plant mom, and girl boss. Fresh out of college, Jane created #bossbabesatx, a community space for women and nonbinary creatives to be fully and permissibly themselves. Since then, her dream has turned into reality — with over 17,000 guests annually and several accolades added to her name.

Starting this summer, #bossbabesatx events saw a void of Zoom profiles rather than a room bustling with creatives. The real, tangible connection Jane prided herself on was missing from virtual events, not to mention the financial difficulties that came with a pandemic. But she is not new to change. Almost immediately, she scheduled a weekly 8 a.m. therapy session and gradually rebuilt her world.

Her journey alone inspires any creative to get off the couch and do good work. But, at our meeting in the bossbabes headquarters, I saw that it was her mindset, not her accomplishments, that truly kept her going.

She sits a social-distanced 10 feet away from me, drip coffee in hand. Dressed in full velvet and a red polka dot mask, Jane blends in seamlessly with the art-adorned creative studio. Her warm, podcast-ready voice projects into the early afternoon light as we chat about anything and everything, from #adulting to having an alter ego. Somewhere along the way, I realized she is the big sister everyone wants to have.

For many, COVID-19 has been a time of difficulty but also of reflection. How have you guys been?

Well, (sighs), I mean, you’re sitting in our space.

So you can see that we’re making major changes because this year has been … I don’t want to be doom and gloom. I’ve learned a lot this year.

We’re a team of four at the nonprofit, and we all feel like we’ve learned so much that we could take on anything that comes next. We’re not fearless, but a little more confident. A lot of small businesses we know are closing, and the communities we serve at large are feeling work to the bone. We’re trying to grapple with reality, but also not get too stuck in it where you feel hopeless.

When organizing virtual events, did you fear losing that raw component of being in person?

The pivot to virtual was really difficult because bossbabes started as a response to only seeing representation online and wanting that in real life. That’s something a lot of us experience. I’ll just identify myself — I’m a white, cisgender woman, I’m queer, I’m fat. I now know I’m bisexual. That’s been a whole exploration. If I didn’t have social media, I don’t think I would have ever known those worlds were possible to make in my own real life.

It’s really hard to be yourself in person. We’re all struggling with internalized oppression and racism and sexism, and we hurt each other’s feelings. But on the flip side, being able to see people with your own eyes and smell them and watch them move in the world: It's freeing. It's liberating. It's exciting. It makes us want to live here. It makes us want to do things.

Going virtual has been ego death after ego death.

Think about that thing you do, where after you do it, you feel like you did something, and you feel like you belong somewhere. I don’t think that belonging is the same in online spaces. All the euphoria I would normally get from an event now only lasts a few hours. It almost feels like it dissolves into zeros and ones.

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You mentioned the idea of just “living” in these stressful times in some of your social posts. How exactly do you deal with discontent or feeling that you’re not doing enough?

Being anxious is sometimes an asset for entrepreneurs because you’re thinking years in advance. You’re subscribing to a level of perfection that helps your work, so your anxiety gets rewarded, which is a really bad thing. At the beginning of this pandemic, I knew I was going to struggle, so I immediately signed up for therapy. I've been in therapy once a week since then. Something I've been struggling with and still holding true is that you have to show up each day and only pay attention to the urgency of surviving that day.

I think it’s good to plan and think about the future. I believe in resiliency. But if you're so much in that world, you don't show up for the stuff that happens every day in your life, and you miss everything. You miss all the good stuff, all the stuff that could change your life.

Showing up each day with attention to your here and now, to your body, to the people around you, to the spaces you're in. That's the daily urgency.

From starting Orange Magazine at UT to now hosting the biggest events in Austin, what has the journey been like?

At the start of my career, I got into festivals because I loved the rush of a good show and meeting a bunch of different people. Now, that doesn’t need to be a driving force in my career or my choices. I’m actually really interested in people who ask good questions. And I’m really, really interested in people who are curious and approach music and art and film with curiosity and resourcefulness. And who just fucking do it. They challenge themselves, and they don't care if they get the accolades.

I didn't self reflect at the beginning of

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my career, but I don't know how anyone could. So, I also look back on my past self with self-compassion because becoming an adult is so hard and so complicated, and no one tells you how to do anything. It's information overload every day, all the time. You just have to do the best you can.

If you could go back in time, what would you tell your 18-year-old self ?

I hate telling this to people who are in college because it can feel really demoralizing, but if I had to honestly tell myself something back then, it would be to not work as hard. In my college years, I spent all my weekends studying, worked a part-time job, and had two internships. I wanted to do it all because I was anxious.

I wanted a padded resume. I came out of college really burnt out and tired, and I’m still recovering from that. I’m 27, and I’m still like, “Oh my god, I can’t believe I did all that shit in college.”

You’re doing yourself a disservice by performing the work. Follow the things you’re curious about. Ask honest questions.

Do quality, not quantity. Focus.

Is there a particular moment or event where everything became real to you? Or when you realized you’ve made it? (laughs) Well, thank you. I don’t think I’ve made it. But just hearing you say I’ve made it, I’m like, “Okay, cool, I’ll take it.”

Surviving this year has probably been the moment in which I’ve been like … this is what I do. Because if I can still do the work

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I do in the midst of a pandemic and still find a way to keep my staff employed and pay the bills and have an impact and make bullshit happen, then yeah, this is probably what I do.

I've been featured in so many different publications. You’d think that kind of stuff would make you feel real, but I don't think anybody else or any other thing can make you feel real. You just have to show up and believe in yourself. I don't really think I've ever done that until this year, which is tough to say, but it's true.

How does being an entrepreneur feed into your music?

Launching the nonprofit and having my own creative studio has definitely sucked the air out of making music. The singing side of me is so disorganized and emotional. But it’s still a part of myself that I have to nurture and cultivate. She really doesn’t give a fuck about deadlines because she’s a response to all the discipline and ideas and goals I have in my day to day.

She just wants to make music, perform, wear good outfits, feel beautiful, and make other people

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feel beautiful. She’s the Yin to my Yang. Not cultivating her can be really disappointing and offbalance. That’s part of having different seasons. I’ve done some fun stuff with my music side. I’ve performed in SXSW and opened for some artists I really respect.

If a career happens there, that’s great. But that Jane Claire has no goal, like she doesn’t give a fuck.

So I’m like, fine. I have to respect that about her. I’m tending on a meandering course to all these different sides of myself.

When Jane pulls into the driveway of the bossbabes studio, she does it in style — in a beat-up Nissan Cube. Its quaint exterior and reliable interior stay true to her personality. She’s the one you go to for fun sleepover talks and life advice, and you know she’ll look good doing it.

Now that Jane’s made it through a pandemic, she has exciting things in store for us: the bossbabes membership launch, contactless in-person workshops, and more music collaborations. The world is limitless for a woman who has reclaimed the power of being fully and authentically herself. ■

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PEARL HOOP EARRINGS | Lauren Madeline

mile cry club

by SAMANTHA PARADISO

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layout XANDRIA HERNANDEZ photographer MADI SHAFFER stylist MADEE FELTNER hmua AMBER BRAY model ANTONIO DORANTES

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I

cry … A lot. I cry a lot. I cry a lot on airplanes. A vehicle for the physical plane, a vessel for my emotional turmoil; flying for me has served more than a transportational purpose. I found myself coming of age at the Tocumen Airport in Panama City. I can trace their floor plan as if it were the back of my hand. Joy, giddiness, excitement, desperation, longing, heartache — these are all emotions I’ve traversed across the Atlantic ocean. I collect passport stamps as if they were family heirlooms, each one further spaced out than the last. Pages with ink-filled borders that once resembled a Rorschach test now stare blankly back at me, I back at it. And I consider all the lost time, missed birthdays, absent milestones.

Sometimes life is best left to cheap gas station calling cards.

I’ve never been good at goodbyes — unoriginal, I know.

Ending a phone call is easier than acknowledging, face to face, that our time together has come to an end. The months between my visits are longer than the visits themselves. And as the days approach for my departure, I find it difficult to enjoy my family’s company because I know this is only temporary. The Morning of Mourning arrives, and I’m ushered to the airport by my great grandmother, grandmother, aunts, uncles, and cousins: unintentional pallbearers in my deliverance. I take one last glance before walking through security, knowing that the next time I see them, they’ll be much older, and I, none the wiser. A few grays turn into a full head of white; wrinkles draping kind eyes deepen; a once quick pace now aches and groans with each step. Sitting in my seat, I run my fingers across the plexiglass window, keenly aware of this closing chapter, “The End” printed on my boarding pass.

There is something melancholy about being on an airplane.

As a child, the excitement of waking up early in the morning and driving along an empty highway would entice me. I got to embark on an adventure as the city slept, and in that moment, it felt like every passing building was holding its breath in anticipation for me. That momentary suspension no longer delights me. It fills me with dread because they know, and I know that this joy is short-lived. The seconds turn into minutes, then into hours, then into days. And as soon as I sit down in my grandmother’s living room, I am once again boarding the plane. I’ve been flying since before I knew how to tie my shoes; bunnies running around and under trees was all too complicated for me, but disembarking a plane and finding my way to customs was my mastery.

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lineage has been reduced to a single plane seat.

There are only three instances in which I flew with my mother. At birth, at the exchange, at her interment. The holy trinity of my grief. Perhaps as a means to connect me to our culture, or maybe to develop my relationship with my family, my mother sent me to live with my grandmother as a child. Seven years later, I returned the favor in delivering her back to the mountains of Santa Fe, her dying wish. The unnatural cycle of a child going before a parent. Every year thereafter, my family ceremoniously travels from province through province to make it to the village where it all began.

Paying homage, we whisper prayers as we brush a fresh coat of paint onto her sunbleached grave. And when it all becomes too much, I make my way to the back of the cemetery and peer over the lush valleys of the countryside. The breeze crosses and clashes together, the trees and their leaves talk to each other, and I cry. I close my eyes and outstretch my arms, and I’m taken back to my mother’s burial. The unforgiving sun casting down on our grief, unwilling in granting our family a moment’s privacy.

The hot earth yielding at our feet, steaming tears sizzling on the baked clay. My great grandmother bracing herself on a tree as she howls, retching her sorrows away. Her piercing screams resonate in my ears — only to realize they’re my own. Each guttural wail louder than the last leaves me feeling lighter and lighter. Palms overhead, arms for wings, I spiral into the grassy knolls, reveling in all that was and is. Slicing through the air, lush, dense, verdant scenery escapes me, as does my past, present, and future. Reminiscing in all the what-ifs and could-have-beens.

Could-haves, would-haves, and shouldhaves escort me down the mountain planes, finally plunging me into my seat on flight UA1919.

There is no bellowing on this flight; my grieving is silent and resigned. Row after row of strangers, each is a witness to my plight. To them, I’m only that girl who cried flying coach. There is no interest nor understanding, just a mutual agreement from those around to pay no mind to the weepy passenger in seat 27A. Complicit in my vulnerability, there is no uncomfortable aftermath, each of us making our way to our respective destinations upon landing.

“Fasten seatbelt” lights shut off, and people disperse; hastily reaching for luggage above and below, my spectators retire as the grand drape descends upon the proscenium of my longing. By the time they reach customs, their minds will have wandered elsewhere, my spectacle long forgotten. Involuntary voyeurs, they remain nameless. As do I.

Passengers doze off around me, and I’m faced with acknowledging my family

I find comfort in this anonymity.

As a child, I’d excitedly make my way through baggage claim and run through those final double doors and into my mother’s arms. Exhausted, my mother would hold me, run her fingers through my hair, and remark on how tan my skin was, how I’d grown a centimeter or two.

I’d press my forehead on the car window, drowsily recounting my trip while holding hands, her thumb caressing my palm.

Today it’s only me; silence and serenity take a backseat as the passing buildings meld and merge together in my rearview window. The drive is quiet, leaving only the lulling white noise of the tire-on-pavement present. I stand at the doorway looking at my dark empty apartment, wondering what it would be like to come home to someone.

Exhausted with no one to hold me this time around, I collapse onto my bed with a sense of tranquil resignation. Slowly drifting to sleep, my gaze falls on my unopened suitcases, reconciling I’ve unpacked my grief before my own luggage. ■

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by MIA MACALLISTER layout JAYCEE JAMISON photographer IAN WOOD set design SOPHIE WYSOCKI

TO THE VICTOR GOES THE

Retelling.

T

he first thing I notice about the room is the smell. It’s old, musty, and honestly, it smells a lot like death.

The English civil wars ended three years ago, and London’s air is only now beginning to clear up. I can’t precisely place the scent — all I know is that it doesn’t smell local. Mixing with the odor of stale death are whiffs of the humid dangers of a faraway rainforest, the hot grits of deserts.

The sons of Britain’s aristocracy have just returned from their coming of age trip around Continental Europe, and the room is suffocating, self-importance crashing around the room in waves. On this Grand Tour, they visited the sites of history’s greatest civilizations and encountered cultures that had never been touched by outsiders. These privileged young men have returned to England, and they cannot wait to show off their new treasures.

Shelf after shelf of an enormous armoire overflows with strange objects to the point that the walls are covered as well. Everything seems to be put in the wrong order. While nothing is immediately recognizable, the way the objects are arranged gives them an air of importance and power, even in their deteriorating state.

On a high shelf, a fancy bronze knife sticks out of a crumbling clay pot. In a back corner, a lizard skull is attached to the body of a cat. I walk further into the room, past rows of indistinguishable clutter. Are these weapons, or are these children’s toys? I truly wouldn’t be able to tell. On the very back wall sprawls a collection of nonsensical drawings. The host of this event had bragged that they were authentic “hieroglyphs,” smuggled out of a tomb.

There are several conversations going on as the recently returned expeditionists spin stories about the cultures they took these items from. Their audience listens with bated breath. I can’t tell which, if any, of their tales are true.

Men who revere objects tend to rewrite history, and this event only further proves that to me.

The sen lives

ese artifacts had ntimentality in other s but are now simply

“NOW, THEY ARE SIMPLY STRANGE OBJECTS TO MARVEL AT.

Their humanity is gone.”

“IN THE ABSENCE OF HISTORICAL ACCURACY, WE INSTEAD LEARN HISTORY THROUGH THE EYES OF THE AFFLUENT AND FIND IMPORTANCE SOLELY IN THE OBJECTS

displayed in their homes.”

everyday objects and showing them off as pieces of “curiosity,” they could rewrite history. Aristocratic collectors, intentionally or not, defined what parts of history were deemed important enough to study, how to study them, and, unfortunately, how to interpret them.

The small pieces of obsidian that litter a field don’t seem to be anything special to the landowner, just pieces of rubble. But this changes when the Grand Tour passes through: suddenly, these objects can symbolize an ancient war field or the last remnants of an exotic, hidden society. While a crumbling clay pot could be the remnants of an ancient culture devoted to sacrificial offerings to their gods, it might actually be just a container for holding dried beans.

When you put aside contextual clues and fail to compare an unknown item to existing knowledge, an everyday item can become a curiosity. In the absence of historical accuracy, we instead learn history through the eyes of the affluent and find importance solely in the objects displayed in their homes.

In their prior lives, these artifacts had sentimentality and purpose. Now, they are simply strange objects to marvel at. Their humanity is gone. The men who collected them want to flaunt how educated and cultured they are, but they don’t care much about using the truth to do this. These Cabinets of Curiosities are a physical demonstration of the collector’s power.

The pattern is simple yet repetitive: go to a foreign country, visit their cultural heritage sites, and take anything and everything that seems interesting.

Permission doesn’t need to be asked for; people are either too afraid or too apathetic to prevent the removal of their heritage. In a time when it seemed as though every inch of land across the world had already been claimed by England, it must have taken a bit more creativity to feel the same sense of fresh dominance and power that their fathers felt.

Without a doubt, these men were able to crack the code of domination in this new world and find a way to keep the power in the hands of the rich white man. They discovered that by taking ancient

These collections pretend to be full of variety and difference, but their biases are dangerously clear.

When the only opinions and theories surrounding your finds came from rich, white men, it must be nearly impossible to come up with an objective statement. The hypocrisy is not lost on me: the men who traveled around Europe and glorified the Romans also visited South America and demonized the Mayans.

These decisions on which parts of history are good and important have and will continue to define the past, present, and future of these cultures for generations to come.

Science is progressing faster than ever before, but I am unsure if it will be fast enough to prevent these misinterpretations from sticking and becoming a reality. I continue to walk around the room, considering the lives of the people who owned these items and whether these exhibits will ever do justice to their lives. There is no way to preserve intent; time decays everything. All that can be done is to hope that future generations will be more forgiving when they inevitably re-interpret our lives. ■

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“THERE IS NO WAY TO PRESERVE INTENT;

time decarys everything ”

ode to night

by SHREYA RAJHANS

Deep into darkness set in the night, a musing that sets my mind alight

layout KATIE LICHTER photographer PAIGE MILLER stylists DAVID GARCIA & CALEB ZHANG hmua CAMERON KELLY & SHANIA WAGNER models DARNELL FORBES & ROMAN CALDERON

“ . . . being able

to convey that gnawing at my soul when their memory Flickers and sputters in my idle mind.�

I

used to lie asleep, but now all I do is lie.

Lie awake and unmoving in the calm of the night.

Waiting. Always waiting for some reassurance that the dark space won’t swallow my soul whole like it did to my body. I can’t see myself in the deep of the night. But I feel I am here, perhaps unwillingly, perhaps fleetingly, but I am here. The space that flows around me connects my racing soul to my static body. It connects me to myself just as it connects me to my experience.

Loneliness is the child of my emptiness. I worry about the future, that one moment. The moment that will define my life, when I will find out whether my body will sink into the inviting earth or whether my soul will float up into a dark sky. And emptiness brings with it the realization of loss.

The loss of my dearest ones looms above my head like a rumbling thundercloud, ready to burst with the gravity of their deaths and separations. The guilt slowly simmers and bubbles throughout an especially stormy day, as the night prowls on the corners of my mind. Slowly it becomes too hard to avoid the humid and clammy feeling of my grief, and the sunset bodes a farewell to my sanity as I see my loved ones faces just within reach as the darkness creeps upon me.

In the night I wonder. How I know I am alive. It starts an unsettling process of why my body feels, and whether I will feel even when I am reduced to a spirit, an essence.

My body is necessary to be a human, to feel love and pain, but my soul is what gives me life. In the night I wonder. What it means to float and die.

The silence is unnerving, it amplifies my thoughts. My head on a pillow, the day running through my mind, racing and racing. I can feel the wind blowing through the trees around me, as though I am surrounded by a chasm of air and leaves. The brown and lifeless leaves that crackle in the dark, and under my feet, like a fire lit in my mind that crackles with an eerie lull. I picture the fire, seeing my reflection in the flickering flames. I think of what I am, what I did, that day. Eating, drinking, studying, speaking. A mindless cycle of mediocrity.

Round and round. Until I am vanquished. Until I am no more.

Suddenly I’m down a train of thought, not unfamiliar, but wholly uncomfortable. I think of disappearing. Poof.

Just one day, being gone. Will I know when it happens, I wonder again. Will I know an existence after it happens, I dare to ask again. Again and Again. The thoughts are old but the night is new. A few hours of rest turn into a lifetime of questions revolving around the end. My end.

The ones I loved, their end.

“ Always waiting for some reassurance that the dark space won’ t swallow my soul whole like it did to my body. ”

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BLACK JUMPSUIT WITH RED TRIMMING | Charm School Vintage BLACK CROPPED BLAZER | Revival Vintage RED LEATHER PENCIL SKIRT | Revival Vintage

“ I'm ' no different because I willingly collapse into the inconspicuous plain of night. ” amuse-bouche

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Not just their memory, not just a wisp, but their whole essence. It escapes my fingers just so. I wonder if I can grasp it in this night. Suddenly the night seems to beckon closer, its howls and swoons speeding through the darkness, with the whispered promise of seeing those I lost, of being able to say a semblance of my regret at their loss. Because their time either came too soon or not soon enough. Of being able to convey that gnawing at my soul when their memory flickers and sputters in my idle mind.

The overwhelming sense of loss tides through my body, the encompassing grief wracks the constitution of my soul, flooding, drowning, burying, until there is silence in the dark again. Until, a single word is crystalized in the air. Why? Time seems to stand still on this night. On every night.

I look into myself trying to see but the darkness has enveloped me.

Space is a monster. It swallows whole and unapologetically.

Eating, eating, until all has been devoured. Until all that’s left is the blankness that is born out of its womb. A monster that just takes and takes and takes.

And I am no different because I willingly collapse into the inconspicuous plain of night. That unassuming blankness that hides a churning loneliness underneath it.

The night is unavoidable, like these thoughts. They come from a place inside me that recognizes my physicality. My mortality creeps up like vines, covering every inch of me until all I can see and feel is myself. What it means to be alive, with a soul, and a body. I feel the space around me as a reminder of the connection I share with another person. The same night that swallows me bridges a delicate thread between me and someone else. I worry if my thoughts pull and strain that thread, hurting the person, making them wonder who’s on the other side of their space. On the other side of their night.

Some nights my worry comes to tears in the hope that the anticipation will end. The salty water is proof of my conscience. I screw my eyes shut and try to chase the sleep that mocks me. Angry and tired, at the incessant thoughts that refuse to leave my side. The windowpane creeks with laughter at my dilemma, the glass it holds together winks at the solution that escapes me. The solution to the emptiness around me that always is out of reach.

I try and try to leave my mind but the feeling there is gone.

I am numb. The night conquers all.

It gives me a space to feel the thoughts I otherwise avoid.

It gives me a chance to reassure myself that I haven’t forgotten my dearest. It allows me to promise my dearest that I’ll see them again in due time. ■

“ The same night that swallows me bridges a delicate thread between me and someone else.�

Do You Remember, Gold?

by JESSIE YIN

layout SHUER ZHUO photographer RACHEL AQUINO stylists GIGI FEINGOLD & SAGE WALKER hmua ZIMEI CHEN & YEONSOO JUNG models MARIE BENNETT & CALLIE KURPIEWSKI

That’s The History, Blue.

We have no control over the memories that become emotional cornerstones in our lives.

BLACK CARDIGAN | Charm School Vintage WHITE BLOUSE | Charm School Vintage

tual measure of time bears no weight here. This is the memory that I will carry with me as the essence of us, of this era in my life long after it has passed.

We all have memories like that. Singular moments that sink into our consciousness and only grow from there. They come to represent, in their entirety, people we loved and places we lived, all those little sidewalk-crack moments of living.

Memories can be physical. The ones that we can’t help but remember become marks on our mental geographies. When we remember them, it can feel like being in two places at once.

When I drive across the bridge on Lamar, and that Austin skyline emerges across the river, for a second, I’m out of time and out of space. Almost superimposed over that sight are images of myself in years past, walking along the streets and pouring out different portions of my heart to anyone who’d listen. Like magic, a place that is squarely in the past has been made present again.

E

Just by living, by existing in this world, we change it. The memories of our feelings linger, even after we are barely affected by them, after we are so far removed from that person we used to be that they are no more than a stranger.

We leave them like little lantern lights to drift through our lives. leven minutes to sunset ...

Sitting in that cafe, I told you everything.

The walls were yellow, peeling near the bottom molding, and we sat at a table in the corner, just the two of us. Through the windows, outside this world of two, the sky was glazing the streets in gold. It was the beginning of summer, when those Texas days started to stretch into the night as slow and sweet as molasses, and it felt like that sunset lasted forever. In my memory, that sun took a year and a day to end.

If someone were to ask me half a lifetime from now what you meant to me, I would tell them about this summer sunset. We had known each other for much longer at this point, but the ac-

Four minutes to sunset ...

When I think about my freshman year, it’s an eternal autumn during those precious few days of cold weather, and I’m sitting at the bus stop behind my dormitory. Through my headphones, Vance Joy sings, “Remember how we were like Gold, when you see me . . . that’s the history, Blue, how we used to roar like an open fire,” and I’m finishing the cup of coffee I got from work as I watch the sun sink below the sloping hills of Dean Keaton. In the span of a few short songs, the world goes from burnished gold, a gentle hearth, to a blue so deep and so hazy that it emerges before the true night like a dream I was never meant to have. I think I was somehow a lonelier girl back then.

"We leave them like little lantern lights to drift through our lives."

Now in my senior year, I don’t understand why this memory of a few autumn days has come to dictate everything I feel about that first year of college. Why is this innocuous scene what I always come back to? Like a compass needle, my thoughts seem to spin and spin around before they inevitably orbit back into these familiar grooves. Sometimes, it drives me crazy how imprecise our memories are. These small moments will loom larger than their bare-bone facts should allow. Meanwhile, there are so many things we forget as routinely and as easily as the sun sets. We lose birthdays and anniversaries, book titles and movie endings, and there is no lost and found for the parts of our lives that disappear.

I remember reading once that depression and trauma have been determined to have an indelible effect on our memory. They diligently and ruthlessly make Swiss cheese of our recollections. Pain is an effective eraser for chunks of our lives while etching into the walls its darker legacies. Sometimes, I want to beg it to give these things back to me. I stand at the burning pyre of my own hurts and demand that I should be allowed small states of happiness, little mundanities instead. In the darkest of nights, let me hold onto the warmth of my own mind.

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"In the span of a few short songs, the world goes from burnished gold, a gentle hearth, to a blue so deep and so hazy that it emerges before the true night like a dream I was never meant to have." amuse-bouche

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"I wonder now if there are expiration dates on memories, if I even want there to be."

Zero minutes to sunset ...

Sometimes, I accidentally pay attention to those 20-or-so minutes when the sky goes from gold to blue. Golden hour and blue hour: those little parts right before and after sunset. It’s not quite part of the day or night, and not part of what we usually consider that moment of sunset. I’m laughing in a park with my friends, and suddenly, with no consideration on my part, the sunlight dies and is consumed by a bruised blue. I feel so alone even surrounded by people. For a moment, I have to learn how to return to myself of the golden hour, asking desperately, how would I act if I were me?

In this liminal space of blue and gold, the passage of time is so abrupt and so apparent in the colors of our world.

It looks like how remembering feels: abstract and impermanent. This is how these moments come back to me.

Sometimes they come simply as nostalgia, but sometimes they come out more as mourning. I don’t want to remember every time that I’ve cried, that I’ve been left untethered by the course of living, but I can’t help it.

I’ve come to believe that we have no control over the memories that become emotional cornerstones in our lives. We don’t get to pick the things that stick with us eons from now.

Nine minutes past sunset ...

In the comforting dusk of a spring night, my friend told me about heartbreak, about how he hung his hopes on a hopeless relationship. As I pleated a navy quilt between my fingers, I wondered if he would ever be able to look back on these years and not see the immense shadow that this boy has cast through the seasons. I wonder now if there are expiration dates on memories, if I even want there to be. Do we ever truly get to move on, or do we live and die carrying within our hearts everyone we have ever loved?

Even after they’re gone, even after they no longer love us back?

In picking at why remembering can be

so unworldly, I worry that I’m committing some kind of faux pas, like asking an artist to explain their work. Maybe we just aren’t supposed to examine the tenuous workings of our own recollections so closely. I can and have sat on my couch for hours, pondering whether there is rhyme or reason to my memories, but it’s akin to tasting for smoke where there is no fire. Maybe memory is meant to be something as inexplicable and as fleeting as a sunset, and we are the ones who have to make peace with our non-answers.

As the last of the ephemeral colors slip into a dark night, I want to ask you, “Do you remember?” ■

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Find Me In The Costume Store

layout KIERA DIXON photographer SHUER ZHUO stylists VINCENT LUU & EILEEN WANG hmua ANNA STROTHER models AMAAN DOSANI & RUSAMA ISLAM

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at the edge of tomorrow layout JULEANNA CULILAP photographer IAN WOOD stylist SAGE WALKER hmua ZIMEI CHEN model LINDSAY GALLAGHER

KNITTED PANTS | Charm School Vintage ORANGE JOCKEY JACKET | Charm School Vintage

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SUIT TOP | Charm School Vintage PINK PINSTRIPED PANTS | Charm School Vintage BLACK LEATHER BACKPACK | Revival Vintage PINK SCARF | Revival Vintage

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PINK PEARL JEWELRY | Revival Vintage BLACK CAP | Revival Vintage

lay A out AN ADR ALY IANA AK T I K I layout ADRIANATO TORRES KALYANA RRES photographer PAIGE MILLER stylist NIKITA list N y hotogLEE ion st hmua ANNA STROTHER & pJANE rapmodels her PAIGDARNELL set & fas&hMAGGIE DEAVER E MILLER FORBES

Do the children of the new world know how to forgive yet?

Does forgiveness mean a loosening of the fist, an unhinging of the heart from the roof of our mouths, so that we might finally say something anything nice about ourselves?

Does it mean we get out of bed and wrestle our heads out from the crowded waters of our dreams, so that we might make a new home out in the brave new world?

Blood in the courts,

blood on my father’s hand,

blood in the mouth of the TV man — Some brave, new world.

So now we wear the faces of a thousand departed souls and against their wishes march in the wine-dark streets, contorting the ancestral into something augural — something we might be proud of someday.

So now we wear the faces of a thousand departed souls and against their wishes march in the wine-dark streets, contorting the ancestral into something augural — something we might be proud of someday.

Do the children of the new world know how to forgive yet?

How to not?

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Do the children of the new world know how to forgive yet?

How to not?

Do we carry our dreams into the pale lands beyond childhood?

Fragments, anyway: The bedroom where we swam like lover-fish in a tank and The lily pond where in the mud I buried your spoon and The garden of suns where you invited me and Mister Rabbit for tea and mouth amusements.

I knew what a precious thing it was, that musical wilderness.

We all did.

The dense miles of forest in our minds, and the strange creatures stalking in the rich underbrush.

We knew it would, like all stuff of dreams, someday fizzle into smoke.

All children of the new world are aware of that time, for we sit from very young with clocks in our bellies.

Counting on fingers and watching in mirrors, dreading the announcement of every new hour — and attuned to it like wolves to a peach silk moon. â–

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