Life lately through rose-colored glasses…

I’m quickly approaching eight years as a resident of San Francisco, something I fought tooth and nail and mostly internally. What began as a seasonal stint slowly became more permanent, though the seven-year itch nearly got the best of me. Lately I’ve been more intentional of how I spend my time. I find myself unplugging on a long bus ride even if there’s 15 minutes left of my favorite podcast, or walking down a different street on the way home just to encounter something I would have otherwise missed.

It’s safe to say I’ve decided to really commit and rekindle my love for the city-by-the-bay. I mean, there’s really no place else to compare. But let’s face it the city has changed; and I do believe that’s the beauty of longevity in a relationship— bearing witness to evolution, complexity, and nuance— holding space for it and deciding to choose it day in and day out. San Francisco is still the same city I fell in love with, and I’m very grateful to call it home.

In my effort to deepen my sense of belonging, I’ve started reintroducing the kinds of things that once lit me up in my teenage years: wandering through the streets of Aspen after dark and stumbling into a Tom Sach’s exhibition blown away by his take on a space landing of course outfitted with a stack of Playboy magazines, or returning to a Gillian Welch album that will always rekindle my first adult heartbreak during a blazing California summer. Rather than trying to blend in, I’ve been keen to bring forth the things that reflect who I truly am though an exploration of my inner landscape and allowing the city to meet me there.

The same jaw-dropping excitement I experienced all those years ago in the Baldwin Gallery imagining an astronaut in space with a Playboy magazine, is how I felt late one night discovering Tracey Emin’s My Bed. The installation was created after the artist experienced a rather painful breakup and spent four days in bed, sustained by nothing but alcohol, smoking, and various pills. Upon first view My Bed provided me with an immediate sense of comfort. It’s hard to believe that despite my innate recognition of the room that created the piece, My Bed did not bode well with everyone after it was exhibited during the 1999 Turner Prize exhibition at Tate Britain. With Guardian newspaper journalist Adrian Searle writing that the piece was an, “endlessly solipsistic, self-regarding homage”. And really, what else is a self titled blog post chronicling what’s keeping me busy but solipsistic?

Carved out some time to write home…

Also, found a treasure trove of mother’s day cards in a local charity shop— nearly all addressed to “mummy”. I’d like to believe God heard my ardent prayer to not only be a yummy mummy, but also to raise globally minded children. This vision does include at least one year world schooling on a catamaran.

I’ve been observing and taking part in market trends via Labubu dolls that are flying off shelves despite $6 tariff upcharge.

Article via Morning Brew newsletter.

On the live music front, I bought a last minute ticket to see Gillian Welch & David Rawlings play the SF Masonic Auditorium. What’s fascinating is I’ve spent the last two years randomly checking their tour schedule and lack thereof and I figured my only opportunity to see them perform live might be to somehow fashion an east coast excursion and catch them at the Newport Folk Festival. So why I waited until an hour before the show to pull the trigger and buy a ticket is beyond me. The show was truly transcendent, with many older songs performed like Wayside/ Back in Time and Look at Miss Ohio, along with many tracks from the latest album like my new favorite— Empty Trainload of Sky. After a few encores they played what we all must have been waiting for: Revelator, and The Way It Will Be.

In the last year or so I’ve had the luck to see some artists I regard as shooting stars (the ones who make their art quietly in places like Marfa, Texas and come around sparingly). Among these I’ve seen: Lucinda Williams, Waxahatchee, Patty Griffin, Evan Dando, and now of course— Gillian Welch and David Rawlings.

My bucket list if you will of these types are:

Hope Sandoval
Blake Mills
Babe Rainbow
Lori McKenna
Antje Duvekot
Malena Cadiz
Laura Marling

“Was it spirit? Was it solid? Did I ditch that class in college? Pull the curtain from my eye I said, “Hey, hey, my, my”

— Empty Trainload of Sky

As of late I’ve come across a handful of Lost films, and despite having no real reason to hyper fixate on the subject, I spent the better part of an afternoon reading a surviving copy of the theatrical script by Leo Ditrichstein which later became the 1915 silent comedy Are You a Mason, starring a young John Barrymore. The most recent among these being The Water Hole (1928), which really struck a chord. I’ve since taken a deep-dive into the topic of Lost films and here’s a short synopsis of what I’ve learned:

Lost films are movies for which no surviving copies are known to exist, meaning they cannot be viewed today in any complete or authentic form. This typically applies to films made in the early 20th century, especially during the silent and early sound eras (1890s–1930s). Early films were shot on nitrate film stock, which is highly flammable and chemically unstable. It degrades over time and was often destroyed in vault fires. Studios did not see long-term value in old films, so many were discarded, recycled for silver content, or simply left to decay. When "talkies" became dominant after 1927, silent films were often considered obsolete and intentionally destroyed or ignored. Poor storage conditions or lack of funding for preservation has led to the permanent loss of some titles.

Another reason films were lost was due to archives being destroyed or displaced during wars, especially in Europe. An example of this is the case of Different From The Others (1919), a controversial German film that portrayed homosexuality as a natural and acceptable part of life. This was not a welcomed concept in the early 20th century leading to the German government banning the film a year later. When the Nazi regime took to power they attempted to destroy all copies of the film. One of the stars and cowriters of the film secretly preserved about 40 minutes of the film by incorporating it into another film- it later ended up in Russian film archives for much of the 20th century. That is until a copy of the film was acquired in 2011 by UCLA. It was successfully restored by piecing together the Nazi era fragments into a nearly full length feature. It’s estimated that over 75% of all silent films made in the U.S. are now lost. The Library of Congress maintains a Silent Film Survival Database documenting what has and hasn’t survived.

How do I come across these niche topics? Well, I’m so glad you asked. It’s as easy as scouring Jean Acker’s filmography on Wikipedia or coming across an intriguing black and white photograph during a reverse Google image search for something else all together. This deep-dive in particular has of course left me feeling quite unwell.

I can only relate to this kind of melancholy the way my grandmother might when recalling things she’s lost. Born in the 1930s, and a cousin of the late and great Empress of the Blues, Bessie Smith. She along with her siblings and some extended family were set to meet her just months before that tragic crash on Mississippi Highway 61. She’d stowed away some of Bessie’s singles and years later, my aunt infamously left the collection in a scorching hot garage in Bakersfield, where the records warped in the heat. It’s not hard for me to imagine that this was the fate for many of silent films not accounted for during the MGM fires. I do have a strong suspicion the heartbreak my grandmother experienced left an epigenetic imprint, as I have held onto a strange anxiety teetering near total phobia towards my own record collection (graciously) stored in my mother’s temperature controlled basement— a first press edition of the U.S. release of the Rolling Stone’s debut vinyl LP is kind of a big deal. I can also hope a loose connection exists to the Hollywood movie studios and there lay unseen silent film superstars in the corner of a basement, or attic untouched by Santa Ana winds.

Shopped for some of the harder to find items for my Neiman Marcus Cookie Recipe. I also made a quick stop at Daiso for sandwich bags, to package them in as a small gesture of thanks for a coworker who’s been kind enough to share her cucumber sandwiches with me over the past few months.

Enrolled in the Chris Heyn University:

We need to come to terms with the fact that the expression, “doom scrolling” is millenial propoganda. Especially when there are creators like Chris Heyn popping up on the FYP and putting us all on game. Often, from his office recapping a weekend here or there, or simply just talking about life and the origins of his stylistic choices. And I’ve gotta say it’s a bit like watching the evolved version of my male schoolmates— like ah yes, this was the desired outcome of my 8th grade middle school math teacher playing Bachman-Turner Overdrive’s “Taking Care of Business” each morning before our exercises. Mr. Macjek was inadvertently preparing us for the C-Suite and high rise office buildings. I’m reminded of this each time I play the song to kick start my day, sometimes it’s the only thing that does the trick. I was Pavlov’d, and that’s quite alright.

infographic via @banditcult

Chris Heyn the 90’s bby mix of Slim Aaron’s & Chief Keef is found on Tik Tok & Instagram @chrisheynjr

Albums I’ve Been Enjoying:

Art I am currently hyper fixated on:

Tracey Emin’s My Bed (1998)

Tracey’s Emin’s works will be on view at the Tate Modern: Feb 26th, 2026 – August 31st, 2026

A great excuse for a trip to London if you ask me.

Researching and pondering the provenance of these two paintings takes up quite a bit of my mental real estate:

What I’ve Been Reading:

Coco At The Ritz, by Gioia Diliberto & The J. Crew Catalog (we are so back)

Ordered some new Boat Shoes from Ebay- let’s just say some girls have red bottoms and some girls nearly get trench foot after getting soaked by a sneaker wave in the Pacific Ocean.