A Most Unforgettable Spring
I develop my yearly goals on my birthday in June so I rarely have new year resolutions. At the start of 2022, in the year that was starting to feel as close to normal as possible compared to 2020 + 2021, I couldn’t help but decide on one main goal: be present. In all things I did or felt, I wanted to carve out time to be grounded and fully present. Read more to see just how important being present was for my retelling of the variety of noteworthy things that happened to me and for me this spring. A fact: I’ll never forget March-April 2022.
March 11th
First Podcast Interview
Episode 59 of the leadersxdesign podcast featuring me aired on March 11, 2022. It’s still wild to me that I agreed to and actually did this. I pushed past hating the sound of my recorded voice and anxiety around whether or not what I had to say about my tiny slice of the internet was worthy of this platform. I had to work up the courage to do the very thing I encourage so many people in my orbit to do: take up space. I’m glad I did this, for me, for women and girls like me and for the lessons learned throughout the process. Use this link if you haven’t listened already and you’re interested in hearing more about me and this very space.
March 13th
2nd Locversary
My less than 300 interlocks continue to be one of the greatest gifts I’ve ever given myself. Two years flew right by as my largely relaxed hair met my determined natural kinks to form very unconventional locs that I absolutely loved. I particularly enjoyed how new everything felt and because of the unique path I took to locs, that there really was little to reference which forced me to just trust the vision and live in the moment. I did two key things ahead of hitting my 2 year mark that’s guaranteed to make the road to year 3 special:
I cut my relaxed ends on February 27th
I had a full day of hair appointments where I dyed my hair with a coppery underdye and deep chocolate everywhere else
March 25th
Real World, Alumni Panel
I was invited to join an alumni panel at my alma mater on March 25th, where I got to speak to students currently in the Visual Communication Design program about my design career. The program’s title is “Real World,” so I delivered the good, the challenging and the transformative highlights for young creatives excited to dip their toe into this complex industry I fell in love with.
As an ‘Art Director’ in my 9-5 role, it’s my job to lead and manage the development + execution of a variety of creative tasks. BUT beyond that, it’s to help the creatives on my team thrive in their careers as creative problem solvers. I believe offering a slice of that to students is my duty, especially those from minority communities that continue to be underrepresented in this field. It was an absolute honor and I also got a flawless Philly weekend out of it, which I’m always here for!
March 26th
pennsive.co Turns 2!
I took an early train back to the DMV on March 26th to attend 1 of 2 days of events I grabbed tickets for during Issa Rae’s HOORAE takeover of the Kennedy Center. The first day was a flip on the Short Film Sunday series just on a Saturday. I saw two great shorts and the surprise feature happened to be a documentary highlighting the beauty of locs, called If These Locs Could Talk. I could not have planned it better myself to be in community with so many loc’d individuals watching a film all about loc journeys on the day this creative space I built for mine turned 2. I had an incredible time and felt so grateful to dip my toe back into the event/concert space with #HOORAETakesKC.
April 3rd
64th Annual GRAMMY Awards
Two weeks before this years GRAMMY Awards, I wasn’t thinking about them at all. I knew social media would keep me aware of any key highlights and none of my favorite favorite folks were performing or set to show up. Then I got a simple Slack message from my manager about a request to support our job’s partnership with The Recording Academy. Everything changed after that point! On April 1st, I got on a flight headed to the West Coast for the most epic work trip I’ve ever been on. I experienced several firsts as noted on IG + my first TikTok and consider it a top tier career highlight. I also wrote about what I packed for the trip on Hilton’s website; a fun experience that I hope leaves a lovely legacy for future creatives and travelers alike.
