; what the hell did I do in 2022?
excuse me as I indulge in the effort to not completely dissociate from the passing of time.
I love to use this time of year to lay around, sigh a lot, and absentmindedly open up Google Photos to try and remember what the hell I did during the past year.
for a number of reasons related to trauma, ADHD, and just general coping mechanisms, I have an absolutely atrocious memory. I often forget large, meaningful swaths of my day, year, or life while simultaneously remembering some of the most inconsequential details of being alive.
it’s weird. it’s frustrating at times. but I’ve been practicing accepting this shortcoming and doing my best to either work around it or prepare myself to later forget (which sounds wild, but it works). so like many folks, I use photography as a way to remember my life since my brain won’t do it for me. and being without Instagram for the past six months (see my last post), I’ve truly been taking photos just for the sake of remembering rather than for content. it’s changed the subjects of my photos, as well as the why, and the when.
so here are some photographic memories from this year, with a bit of my 29-year-old wisdom and naivete, sprinkled in.
february — god, I start to act feral during february. on this particular day, I woke up and stared out the window at the grey world of snow and clouds and thought, “I should get my hands tattooed.” in order to have a thought like this and actually act on it, you should have already had at least one or two tattoos that you disliked/covered up, leading you to acknowledge that your body is merely a shell that will one day deteriorate into the earth so it genuinely doesn’t matter how you modify it. I wouldn’t recommend tattooing your hands until you’ve reached this point, because it’s a hyper-visible part of your body that random folks have strong feelings about seeing tattooed, and god forbid you also have feelings of regret on top of having to defend your choice.
anyway, I walked into Grand Ave Tattoo in Saint Paul and a lovely man by the name of Evan put these gorgeous olive branches on my hands and I happily have no regrets about it. I love my hands so much more now!
also february — part two of me feeling feral: I scooped up my partner and drove us out to the Getaway outpost in Kettle River, MN for a couple of nights during valentine’s week. what an absolute dream to be in a tiny ass cabin with a queen-sized bed, running water, and the woods right outside your window. I’m a minnesotan in the way that I love to be outdoors and hike and shit, but good god…my ancestors didn’t escape the dire conditions of American slavery for me to be sleeping on the ground and going without hot water for more than 24 hours at any point in my blessed life. (that’s what I say whenever people ask me if I like camping instead of the more complicated explanation that I camped a lot with my family as a child and, unfortunately, have a lot of bad memories associated with it. or admitting that I simply don’t like being uncomfortable for any amount of time because I’m a brat.)
march — the biggest gift to myself this year was getting back into my hobbies. being my business’ sole employee took up a surprising (read: not at all surprising) amount of time, and my hobbies were the first victims while I tried to manage my energy. and y’all know me: I’ve spent the last few years interrogating my own beliefs (and more importantly, actions) surrounding rest. I knew it was more than just sleep, more than meditating, or dissociating from stress. but it took some time to come to the understanding that it includes giving your brain things to do that aren’t “important,” urgent, or tied to some survival need. video games are one of the hobbies I found myself reconnecting with in order to provide my brain with rest (look up “cozy games”…it’s a whole thing).
also march — I was a keynote speaker for a DEI event at the University of Minnesota (my alma mater) which STILL makes me lmao because I barely fucking graduated from college, yet there I was, getting paid to give a speech about how to advocate for yourself as a gifted Black or brown person in majority-white fields (something I know too much about). I was soooo scared oh my god, I am not a Public Speaker in my opinion and have never wanted to be. the issue is that I went to school for Communications so I’m good at it. if you’ve ever been good at something that you dislike, my heart goes out to you…people will keep asking you to do it and you’ll be like, *single tear sliding down your cheek* “ok.” cool experience though!
april — I turned 29 and put a crown on in public for the first time in my Aries life to celebrate the last year of my 20s. I will be making it a regular thing. if you’ve never seen yourself in a crown, this is me saying you’d better do it in 2023.
june — back in the Before Times, my friends and I had planned a trip to Barcelona, Spain to attend the Primavera Music Festival during summer of 2020. when May 2020 rolled around and there were talks of the vaccine still being up to a year out, it became obvious it wasn’t happening. by the time the rescheduled festival came around this past summer, it had been four or five years since I’d been on a proper vacation. and my god was it worth every saved cent it took to go. I’m so ready to take more trips with my friends (whom I’m obsessed with), and say yes to things I’d never done before (like attend an international music festival!!) in 2023.
also june — I’m so glad I’m making this post, because I’m realizing that 2022 was a year of firsts in a way I’m not sure I’ve had since I was in my early 20s. I helped organize a large-scale Juneteenth event along with a group of smart, driven Black women. I’ve never been part of the behind-the-scenes work of a large event before and lemme TELL YOU…that shit is a lot of sweat and tears. over a thousand people showed up to celebrate, and I hope twice as many come for this year’s event (keep an eye on Blackbird Revolt’s instagram for info about it closer to summer).
august — not a secret, but I have borderline personality disorder. it’s an incredibly misunderstood disorder that you absolutely are being ableist if you call someone with it “crazy” or “insane,” but I can and will say that I’ve been on one when I’m having a BPD episode lmao. I had one this year that almost caused me to end my relationship due to how swiftly I disconnected from reality and sunk into anxiety and fear. you’ll notice I said almost caused me to end the relationship, because while I was like “idk I think I should leave you before you leave me,” my partner was doing what my partner does so fucking well, which is loving me through it. I learned how beautiful and healing it can be to be cared for while the parts of you you’ve always deemed unlovable are being seen. so to all my nice, pretty girls who are insane and traumatized: you are so lovable. you deserve love. and there are people out there with the capacity and ability to love you through it all.
october — I feel like this year was the first year since I started drinking (at maybe 15 years old) where my relationship with alcohol is completely comfortable. I went to Las Vegas with my friends and left without a single hangover. 23-year-old me would’ve blacked out or thrown up at least once trying to keep up with what she thought was the only way to drink and socialize. I’m so proud. I smoked a ton of cigarettes though so…baby steps lmao.
december — it’s very special to know that something wouldn’t exist without your silly little brain thinking silly little thoughts about this silly little life. I walk into this bookstore and I get to see a part of my existence as a Black, queer, Minnesotan woman made tangible. I see something that was dreamt, then spoken, then labored into existence by myself and my community. unbelievably lovely. I’m so glad 2022 saw Black Garnet Books become a real thing. I hope what we’ve made is expanded upon in 2023.
I’m slowly incorporating more of my hobbies into my periods of rest, so I’ll be writing more in 2023 now that my biggest labor of 2022 (opening a whole ass bookstore) is up and running. I have a writing buddy (hi Moses!) who helps me set aside time each week to put metaphorical pen to paper. I really need it because I was fully in the “head empty no thoughts” era of my life for the past 6 months so I could do what needed to get done, but we all know that ain’t sustainable. a bitch has things to say!!
and so they shall be said. cheers!