“I'm not going to that party if you invite her” I frowned at Brittyn while the E Train barreled us towards Queens.  “GIRL! She's my coworker, I can't uninvite her.” She groaned.  I rolled my eyes and slumped down into my seat. “I'm not gonna dance with her then and I'm not gonna talk to her and neither will the rest of us”  Brittyn put her palm in her face and winced. “Girl I know. I didn't realize she was racist… well I don't know for sure if she's fully racist.”  I rolled m

I'd be scared of people knowing what I say and do too! "Your cousin doesn't want to speak to you about what she's been doing to you because she's afraid you'll write about it" I cannot relate to that, it actually sounds like foolishness to me. I fantasize about the things I do and say being heard by others because I only do things I'm proud of. I know that's not the norm for people, I was uniquely gifted the opportunity to feel this way about my actions because my mother used

I think “Deja Vu” is one of the few Beyoncé songs that I really love. It's fun, it has a funky instrumental, and the performance for it is always so cool. I usually only see “Deja Vu”, written out when I type it into Apple Music. However, this week, someone sent me that phrase twice. They told me that I give them a strange sense of “Deja Vu”. I don’t know how to say that he's not the only person that feels that way about me without making him less unsettled, so as usual, I'm

“You cannot give adults consequences! They aren't children” my mother pleaded with me on the phone as I explained to her that there must always be consequences for misbehavior if change is to occur for the 1000th time.  I genuinely do not understand where my mother got the idea that consequences are not an important part of human societal construct. I'm not sure if it's copium on her part because she doesn't like that I uphold strong boundaries for bad actors or if it's that

It all started with Sailor Moon for me, really. My mother once took away my privilege to watch that show because there was a kissing scene in it between Usagi and Mamoru, but I was allowed to watch it again when I turned 13. I think I wouldn't have been as affected by the love story if I'd watched first as a child, but instead, I watched it as a:  Religious  Autistic  Uncool  Sheltered  Bookworm Socially awkward  Theater doing Chess club joining Anxious  Slightly asexual  Clo

Be honest with yourself, so you can be honest with me...this season of Bridgerton is lacking the foot kicking romance we all watch for. There are a lot of reasons why, but the biggest is that Benedict Bridgerton is the guy your friends have to push you to give a chance to while hunching over your phone, pivoting it from side to side, and pleasing with you to believe he just doesn't photograph well. (They're doing this because you need to get over your last relationship. I was

Today I sat with my Great Uncle in hospice. Without hesitation, I boarded a train with my cousin (his grandson), missed the premiere of a movie I am in, and made my way to Maryland to be with him on one of his final days. In my memory, I have never not done that. I have always found myself by the side of my dying elderly relatives. To me, it is part of my regular life. To be there for their transitions. I notice though, to others, the normalcy of it for me is out of the ordin

Somehow, despite being a multitime history award winner, I am just now learning about the Carpathia. The ship that melted its own boilers in an unimaginable effort to reach the Titanic as quickly as possible while it sank. This ship was the first responder to the Titanic SOS. It was four hours away from the Titanic, it had a top speed of 14 knots, it had to navigate the same ice field that sank the Titanic, and the anticipated journey to it was supposed to be four hours. Yet

An ego is a terrible thing to let get in your way. Today I was driving back from yet another K-Pop Demon Hunters party. Thank God for the K-Pop Demon Hunters parties. I'm looking forward to inviting everyone to my housewarming. Thanks to the K-pop. Demon hunters parties.  I was talking to the K-Pop Demon Hunters group for today. Daniela (not to be confused with Dani), Nina, and Yiran. We had a 53 minute drive back from the party and we were itching to fail the Bechtdal test.

Unlike many people in the Jersey City and NYC, I'm qualified to tell you who does a great manicure because I'm from South Florida. We are serious about beauty in South Florida. No boring "clean girl" aesthetic, no monochrome, no slick backs; in South Florida, we do Diva. In Jersey City and NYC, beauty providers that provide for Divas are are to find. I was looking for a nail tech that had it all:  •appointments  •a private or semi private space  •lots of experience doing intr

For most of my life, my strategy was silence. Not the peaceful kind. The kind where you slowly back out of the room without saying goodbye, hoping no one notices the shape you leave behind. I called it self preservation. I called it maturity. I told myself that not reacting was the same as being evolved. But really, I was ghosting my own life. Recently, something shifted. I stopped vanishing and started speaking. I learned that one of my aunts had belittled my experience of b

When my friends tell me they have IBS, I often wonder “would they have IBS if their boyfriend wasn't such a loser?”. I am a regular pooper, but I also have no soft spot in my heart for people who mistreat me. So, I'm not often in guy wrenching emotional turmoil. Everyone that I know that has developed IBS, is soft for people that are junk food for the soul. Friends, boyfriends, and family members. What they don't give a class in at college is that bowel movements are not rand

If I have ever liked you, you'd best to believe you're super odd. Like super odd. You are some combination of the following:  Super offputting despite really trying to interact with people  You have very few friends  You have an unconventional job/ lifestyle You are weirdly fixated on something  You are super soft inside  You are desperate to be seen  You are particular  You are bossy  You are moody  You are desperate to understand normal people  You are strikingly beautiful

My cousin Xel told me something recently that felt less like a comment and more like a clinical observation from a gentle nurse walking you into a padded room. Speaking from experience. 🫰🫰 She said to me, “You don’t believe there’s any man who could actually be right for you.” She said it gently, which is how people speak when they are both loving and correct. That's how Xel always speaks. Xel has been romantic since birth. The kind of person who has always believed in roma

Sometimes I fantasize about never speaking to my family again. Ghosting them if you will... Not in a dramatic, door-slamming way. Not with speeches or ultimatums or long text messages that try to sound calm while bleeding through the screen. I imagine it the way Americans seem to do it so cleanly— I’m done , and then they’re done. No lifelong echo. No ancestral chorus humming in their chest. No constant moral hangover. For them, it appears to be an option. For me, it feels un

I watched this Tik Tok today and felt genuinely inspired. I then remembered a story that a friend once told me about two women in her life who were orbiting the same man. One of them was patient to a fault. She listened endlessly, softened every conflict, and stayed even when she felt herself becoming smaller. She believed love meant understanding him through his worst moments. She was always available. Always forgiving. Always trying. The other woman was the one he called “

NicoTV. Who is NicoTV? I have my theories. I think I know who NicoTV is, but I don't actually know. There are tons of NicoTV accounts and I won't share the actual username on the account for fear of scaring whoever it is, but the "name" on it is NicoTV. NicoTV spent a year and 7 months watching my tik tok account daily, sometimes multiple times a day. I know this from the profile views. I am near certain that I know who it is because once upon a time, a marked the account by

“I think you should get to know me better.”  At first, I thought I said that out of spite. To prove how little he knew and how much I did. I shouldn't say I “thought” because I did say that out of spite. However, most actions are inspired by more than one feeling. The words have been haunting me. Creeping into my consciousness. Sneaking up behind me. It usually takes more time for The Ghost of Conversations Past to bedevil me. I am weary though; too weary to meditate, too wea

I'm not married and that's why I feel qualified to tell you these things. Strong statement, I know, but I'm willing to bet that if you're ages 23-30 in the NYC Metro Area, all your married friends met their partner in college or settled. If they met their partner in college, great. They're an awesome couple with no idea what it's like to date as an adult. If they settled, they're victims of the copium epidemic. If they are the outliers, let me know what prayer they were doing

There was a time when romance lived in the voice. Before dating apps and swipe culture and endless group chats flattened the nuances of communication, there was intention in how men spoke to the women they desired. A softness. A warmth. A clear separation between the way they spoke to friends and the way they spoke to someone they were genuinely drawn to. Somewhere along the way, that art faded. Today, many women are left interacting with men who speak to them with the same e