2021

Well here we are again…
Every year the time seems to pass faster and slower somehow, and I look back and realize the growth and change and beauty despite feeling so stagnant and bored and confused and frustrated and lost for most of the year.

This year started out slow — while spending time with family, we experienced one of the most challenging losses together. I still see Sherri everywhere in my daily life, whether it's seeing Creme Saver candies for the first time in years, in the girl with downs syndrome that comes into a model casting, or hearing her sayings slipping into my daily vernacular. Coming back to the city to an empty apartment and not much work to fill my time, it was a rough first couple months. I felt very alone and didn't know how to ask for what I needed most times. When work started to pick up and I got off of medication that was sending me even further into a downward spiral, things started to lighten up a bit. March, April, and May passed with little excitement, besides a short stint with blue hair before chopping half of it off, and a staycation with Andrea. In June I committed myself to training to run 25k for my 25th birthday, traveled to Chicago to work on a project with friends, celebrated my birthday with a few friends on our roof, and learned that solo bike trips to the beach are wildly fulfilling.
July began with a friend reunion in boston for the 4th, and then traveling home for my oldest friend's wedding. It was a hot summer of outdoor shoots and sweating my way all over the city, but I wasn't as mad about the warm weather this year.
My quarantine habit of self portraits has continued throughout this year and even though it started out feeling juvenile and worthless, I feel like I've grown through being able to experiment on my own and try new things and explore where the shoot takes me without an end result in mind and the pressure of time or others. 
Andrea and I rang in fall with the last summer friday at the beach, and I dyed my hair red(ish) for the first time. I had the busiest month of the year, with work, Megan, Cass, and my parents visiting, and a (very eventful) solo trip to Pine Creek, before Vada moved in and Andrea's birthday. 
October flew by and before I knew it, it was November, which I have come to the conclusion is my favorite month of the year. The leaves are changing and the temperature has finally dropped and everything feels cozy without being too cold. Andrea and Vada and I spent the end of November going to the farmer's market, getting a christmas tree, and sitting on the couch with bagel sandwiches, wrapped in blankets, drinking tea and hot cider, and binging vampire diaries until we couldn't hold our eyes open any longer — and I couldn't have been happier. Living with your friends is truly such a blessing when you all operate as the grandparents from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. 
December wrapped up with cranberry hair, a quick trip to Miami for work, Fransgiving, everyone and their brother getting covid in NYC, and luckily still being able to go home to see family before coming back to the city for a solo new years eve… which brings us here.

I'm shocked that I've somehow survived my first year of freelancing, staying in the black, not having an emotional breakdown, and still experiencing so many wonderful things. We can only go up from here folks.

hello 2022. I'm ready for this next year, it's gonna be epic.