cortina

cortina. 

cortina is a force in asheville and one of those rare types that is self motivated and truly hustles, hard. she/they recently started the ade project in town, standing for artists designing evolution, which creates community and opportunity for artists of color in asheville. they spearhead anti racism campaigns across town. they create, host, present in, and facilitate events for the community of color. they are probably the busiest person i know, and certainly one of the most inspiring. have you been thinking about racial equity in asheville? this is a person to follow.

cortina welcomed us to her home with a stunning view in barnardsville where we sat on the front porch and talked about connection, healing, community, and creativity. how to respect what has been, how important self care is, and how to keep pushing in the right way. they are naturally eloquent and did not have one bad thing to say about asheville (!!) — which was crazy yet incredibly refreshing. i think we (myself included) often spend more time looking at the problems, and not working towards & being hopeful about the solution. in this respect, cortina is a go-getting light for us all to follow, and in many ways is carving out the path.

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what is your story and your relation to Asheville? How'd you end up here? 

Well, I was born and raised in Morganton So I'm actually a native to Western North Carolina. I remember my first experiences of Asheville when I was younger were when I would come up with my grandmother to help her work bele chere. but there was a point in my life in 2011 where I was going through some changes, and I was really clear that I was wanting to be very intentional about my life from that point forward. I wanted to also start a business — and I ended up just taking myself to Asheville on vacation. I came up here on Valentine's Day after this really rough breakup with my partner at the time, and then I fell in love with the city. I remember that moment when I was driving into the City - when you're at the exit for Charlotte Street between Charlotte and Merrimon and you're coming up on the sun and the city - and I noticed all the murals and art…and I'm just such an artist at my core. I got really curious and I ended up moving here and completely turning my life in a different direction by September of that year.

so it's been a while! It's been what, eight years? 

yeah coming up on eight years, 

but it's like coming home almost..

it is. it’s a homecoming. 

the funny thing is when I grew up The Narrative was like: go off to school, be successful, move away. the narrative was Never: grow up, be successful, stay here and do something. right? because our families wanted us to have more than they had, and all they knew was what their experience was -  which was being here. and so they encouraged us to go away and I feel like I needed to go away because I needed to figure out who I was. but, it was clear to me at some point when I was with my partner at the time and we were looking at California and Atlanta — and I just never felt like I could move somewhere else. North Carolina is so many things, but these mountains especially are very very special. there's a lot of healing in these mountains. asheville actually was a place where people came to heal back during tuberculosis was it it was endemic. so it's in it. It's in the space. you come here to heal, and that's what i did. 

how would you describe Asheville to other people now? 

I think I would continue on that same thread that I shared which is the healing. for me, one of the things that I really value about this place is that our capacity to heal ourselves and each other and it Ripple out to the world are so big. I think it has to do a lot with the kinds of people that came here and called this community home at one point. again — the nurses, the Medics, the practitioners that were helping people heal. Their energy is here. Fitzgerald, E.W. Grove, George Vanderbilt — these are innovators. Buckminster Fuller with Black Mountain College. the energy is here. This is where people came to innovate and try things and tinker and experiment with life. And so I think that we have this amazing capacity to to be the innovators, and I feel like that's happening. it's clear to me that the work that we're all here to do is around our healing so that we can show up more fully and that we can see each other more deeply. 

what would you say to the people that are leaving or giving up on Asheville?  

Mmm. Here's the thing. think about whenever you get sick. when you are sick, you have to take medicine, right? and the medicine doesn't always taste good. sometimes it stings burning down, sometimes it has side effects..some people can't handle the side effects of Asheville. Yeah, and some people are like, ”the side effects are a lot! I'm out.”

But I actually had this conversation with a friend recently who moved down here from the Northern Area. their Journey was my journey when I first moved here, and so many people's Journey — Asheville will light your ass up! Asheville will light you up as soon as you say yes to being here. like, it's on. it’s a cleansing fire. but you have to commit. it’s crazy because literally I'm in my eighth year and I'm in the express lane. I think for me I finally survived enough of these Cycles after being here eight years to get there. and, there's been this really amazing and beautiful Community that's been cultivated.

when I started my first business in 2011 when I moved here - it was called visit in Venture - I was clear that there was this disconnection between tourism and the community. I was in the tourism & hospitality industry at the time — I had started working there in college in Greensboro, worked my way up to management, and got really good. i worked at some of the best resorts in our state working in sales bringing in millions of dollars a year. and there was a point for me as a person who is super introspective — I was like, “wait a minute. how are these Resorts making millions of dollars and it's not in any way supporting the community? furthermore, people are coming here for the Arts and the cultural experiences in these community, So why aren't the resorts supporting that?” so I started a business based on that Gap. the whole concept was to do tourism product development management and Consulting, and help destinations, businesses, or artists really leverage themselves in the industry. Long story short — What I can tell you is that tourism is the number one economic driver for any Community. communities that are recovering from tobacco and Manufacturing leaving — like Morganton, my hometown — now, they're depending on tourism. And so if that's true of every community in this country, then we also need to be looking at what is that connection to the community? and what is bringing in the people? for me it's always been clear. after I started the business. I was like, I really shouldn't be working with these destinations. I really should be working with the artists and entrepreneurs because these are the people who are bringing people in And giving them this experience…making this community what it is. so, that's kind of when my journey deepen a little bit further and I think that's really when the seeds started to be planted for me to form What is now artists designing Evolution - the project which I started last year. 

yes speak to that a little bit. 

if I were to verbatim tell you what the mission statement was I would say — it is to actualize equity, spark creative inquiry, and reclaim the narrative. I know it. but the experience of it is, or what I know from my experience and also from sharing in these stories and relationships with other people is, that art is a universal language that allows us to speak and transcend barriers and difference. what I also know is that there's economic mobility in the Arts. and we have allowed ourselves to believe this illusion that we are not creative, Therefore we can’t imagine, therefore We can't question anything, Therefore we can't think critically. So for me it's also about: how are we using this process of creativity as a process of enquiry so that we really are shaping the world around us? and we're creating things and we are designing? it's about supporting the artist and the creative professional just as much as it is about preserving and nurturing the communities that really need art at the center and at the heart of what's going on to bring people together.

September 2018 we started the ADE project. we had the launch party in February, actually on February 26, which was the anniversary of Trayvon Martin's passing. in honor of him, we called it triumph for Trayvon. that's when we unveiled to the public, and it was really beautiful. it was really surreal. I love each and every person that came to that event so much. I feel like I had a story with everybody, and I was just wanting to go around the room and connect and share stories and I just had this moment of reflection being like — that's what it's about. relationships, therefore building Community, Therefore we are creating and doing things together. that for a lot of people was one of the most diverse rooms that they've ever seen in asheville. that's why I had to have that moment when I first got on stage of being “like this is Asheville!”

what I like to do in my own maybe unicornish fairy way is just find these moments of connection, because for me that's what it all comes down to. it is only about connection. actually in the seek healing training that we went to, that was a big part of what they shared with us. The opposite of addiction is not being sober, It's connection. when people are disconnected is when we see crime and violence and mental health problems and addiction and hate and racism. we have to not create that “other” and actually realize that the more connected we are either to place or people, the more we're actually invested in what happens. everybody just benefits. 

Okay, if you could spend 24 hours in the life of someone else, who would it be? 

Oh my gosh! 24 hours? Alright, I’m sorry, but you said someone So I'm gonna actually name neytiri from Avatar. you said anyone! that's probably my favorite movie of all time. like, wow. I could connect to a horse looking thing, I could fly a pterodactyl, i could be climbing mountains. Yeah. I'm about it. 

what's one surprising thing that you carry with you?

I don't know if I'm some people will be surprised to hear this but I usually either carry one of two things — either some sort of affirmation, or a Crystal or a stone. I find myself in conversation with people a lot and so sometimes if I'm nervous about a thing or I'm tense, the stone is really good for grounding. the affirmation is just reminders. when it gets hard and you feel like quitting — this is your reminder. you know? 

when you're pushed to your Edge, how do you cope?

I haven't always practiced those things. I've had to learn it, and I actually had to learn it the hard way. I realized maybe like three years ago that i was carrying probably just as much as I'm carrying now, but I wasn't really tending to myself. there was some shit that was going wrong. in 2011, I was probably the unhealthiest that I have ever been. there were a lot of stressors around that time. part of me was just healing the first year I moved here. I worked out every day, I was basically vegan, I read a lot, I wrote a lot. I was doing the artists way by julia Cameron - and that had changed my life. I was doing a lot of things, but it wasn't until the second year I was here that I actually started meeting people. and there have been little reminders along the way until finally maybe three years ago The message was really loud and clear. My body was just like, “I need you to like pause sometimes.” 

now I have practices that I do. I try to have at least one self-care day a week. I'll adjust my schedule if I'm feeling like I need to rest, or work from home, or whatever I need to do. because the work is heavy — Equity work is not light work. and it's too important, so I don't want to burn out. We lose people all the time just from being unhealthy and not taking care of themselves. it feels like it's a responsibility. actually, if you're being responsible and you’re organizer or a community leader, you would be taking breaks. 

this specifically for me is something that came up really strongly doing my own Equity work. for black women, this is the first time in our history where we're even getting to talk about self-care. Our ancestors — number one, were brought over here in voluntarily, and number two, when there was this “idea of freedom” in order to survive you still had to put other people before you. literally the women - the work that they did was going to other people's houses and taking care of their kids, and their house, and them. and by the time they got home, there wasn't time for anything else. how could you teach your kid something that you don't know? we've inherited these generations of neglect…of self-neglect and of self-abuse. and so this is the first time, I think it's our generation - the millennial generation - where we are like: “actually this is part of Liberation. This is social justice work to say, ‘actually my time is important and I'm important enough to take a break. i am worth that.’” 

it is part of the work too, and that's a really important conversation that I have with a lot of people - especially other black women who are in the work, helping community and holding space for a lot of people. we can't carry around this guilt because it's killing us. and that doesn't exclude anybody. we should all be taking breaks. we live in this capitalist society, which is all about producing producing producing what will cost you the least and have the maximum gains — but not for the people who are doing the jobs. working conditions used to be shit, and to think that they've improved but we're still killing the planet is wild. we can't be this producer Society anymore because it's literally killing us and the planet. it's just that simple. 

I'm a person that believes that everything happens for a reason. even in moments that are really hard and feel really shitty, I always come back to that. I'm always like, “okay, This one was challenging — What am I supposed to learn from this? how can I grow from this experience?” that's really served me in a lot of ways, and I think about how our natural form hasn't been the form that we've taken as a society for the past generations. it's almost inevitable that we return to our natural form - which is why we're seeing a push for creating innovation and feeling. it is literally just taking us back to the originals, back to the indigenous. We're coming back to practices that we haven't heard or seen in literally Generations right now. when you think about how things are circular, it's also connected. the connection is literally all around us. and I think for those of us that know that and are paying attention, this feels like a really sacred and important time. 

so I know that you use ceremony in your work. can you just talk a little bit to what that is for you and what that means for you? 

i don't think I mentioned this earlier, but the work with Ade is very much connected in the culture, and in the originals, and in the Traditions that birth what we now are calling art today — and a lot of that has to do with African tradition. the organization is really around the work with and by artists of color, so it's important to be authentic in how we're showing up. culturally, Our Heritage and our tradition was what we're now calling art. there are some things that just went together. as I've been tracing my ancestry and really doing my own cultural work, it's felt really important to me to hold space for ancestors. in African culture you acknowledge Generations that came before you, the ones that are coming after you, and the ones that sit in line with you. in order for us to hold space for the ancestors and really call them in and invite them to do the work with us, alters are part of our culture. It's something that's kind of been lost. we kind of see some of that, I mean, you kind of see Alters being created. if you drive on the highway and you see some flowers and a cross where somebody passed away, that's an altar. these things have just been connected to our culture, but we haven't given them the proper name or acknowledgement.

it's just creating this container where we're saying — this actually is a thing. and it's part of our culture to hold space for the ancestors. anytime that I have an event with Community, especially at the Gathering like Triumph for Trayvon, It just feels really important for us to acknowledge those who came before and those who lost their lives in this social justice and Liberation work, because people have. we're standing on their shoulders and it's really important to acknowledge . it is so important in African ceremony. From what I've studied and read — a lot of my readings have been from malidoma some and sobonfu some, who recently passed away but has actually been to Asheville and held a few grief circles for our community — it's connected and it feels so relevant. And then again, it's like this tether, this line that is continuous. these are ancient practices in Africa, and literally when you read one of their books — there's a book that I recently read called the spirit of intimacy — I'm like, this is everything that our community has been talking about: viewing relationships, Cooperative economics, this idea of sharing money. we do it now. think about Airbnb, Uber, lyft. these aren’t new Concepts. we've been doing these things in Community for forever. that's what I mean by things coming around full circle. we're realizing we can lean on each other and find ways to share in the economy.

what is a technological advancement you do like like? what's your favorite?

Oh my gosh, I honestly have to say AirBnB. that’s my favorite thing that's come along in a very long time. I think for me it's kind of the way that I like to travel and live my life. when you go stay at somebody's place at an Airbnb, you're staying in their home and you're getting an experience and you're building Community with people. and that somehow feels much more personal than me going to stay in a hotel room. I bet if the BCTDA is listening to this or anybody involved in tourism people are cringing because of occupancy tax. I get it about the occupancy tax, but the reality is — the reason why Airbnb caught on like wildfire is connection. people go to somebody's home and you get to stay in these cool places, and the places have stories. sometimes you get to eat dinner with the person. 

What are you learning are working on right now?

I don't know. everything. I think it would appear as though my biggest project is artist designing Evolution. However, I actually feel like the real project is me working on myself. i had this conversation with my business coach / Co-op developer Kimberly Hunter — Shout out to Kimberly Hunter — who shares a lot of my thoughts and principles around business and community. i had to slow down my process with my homework that I was doing in between our meetings because I realized there were some things coming up for me around business decisions. I really had to check in with myself and what felt like the right decision - not just from a business perspective for the good of “business” - But what also felt like the moral or ethical thing to do. I'm a person of really high integrity and I have really high expectations of myself. I tend to also have high expectations of others, and sometimes that's annoying as fuck but sometimes it works, but I had this moment of real Clarity where I realized — oh, actually having a business is a lot like birthing a child. you're literally birthing from the same place, the same energy. it's all creativity, It's all creating a thing. except instead of this thing having a human life form, It's in the form of an idea. it's a concept and you're still shaping it and you're growing it. and just as much as the child or the baby is learning, So are you. there have been some things that I've really had to look at. I had to really look at my relationship with trust, how I wanted to share and distribute power and resources, collaboration… really checking into my definition of transparency. I think that I overshare a lot of times and what might feel overwhelming to some people and what might feel good to know. so just things like that. it's a thing that feels like I gave birth to in a way, and I'm also growing as it grows, and that was the realest reality check ever.

all of that to say that I've just had to surrender to creativity, and I've had to surrender to things being nonlinear and to the process. and that's been actually the real project.

do you have words that you live by or like a motto? 

well, everything happens for a reason. but also my favorite quote of all time, which actually sometimes gets misquoted as Nelson Mandela's because he used it in his inauguration speech, but Marianne Williamson's from a return to love..and I won't say All of it but she says that our deepest fear is actually not that we are inadequate but that we are more brilliant beyond our own belief, dot dot dot, by letting your light shine you liberate others to do the same thing. 

Do you have a funny vomit story?

oh my god, I actually hope that I don't throw up telling the story. I'm so much of an empath that i have visceral responses to things. and that’s actually what happened in the story. it was recent and real bad…so I was flying home from Oakland. This was last month at the beginning of April — I was at this conference and my flight back gets delayed twice to the point to where I have to book a whole other flight and fly not to asheville, but to Charlotte. my partner B is going to pick me up from the airport so I had to send her a message saying: hey, here's my flight information. Like, I’m about to take off, I barely made this flight, and I have to now get picked up from Charlotte. and coming from Oakland it’s a six hour something flight so I had no other way to send any other communication until I landed. when i landed I had several missed texts from b, and this part is not funny, but she was basically throwing up the whole way to Charlotte and had to keep stopping because she was badly sick and basically thought she had food poisoning from something. and she has to pick me up in charlotte! So she gets to the airport and she has a little throw up on her pants. and i already said that i have a weak ass stomach. and she hasn't vomited in the car, but the car smelled like vomit. oh, and the other part of this story was that my cycle had just started that day and every time my cycle starts, I'm sorry - This is real vulgar, But you asked for the story! I either have really bad diarrhea or I vomit. Yeah. and I had gotten through everything that day and hadn't gotten sick, and somehow had an okay first day of my cycle. but then I'm in the car smelling this vomit, and I had seen the vomit on her pants and I'm like: “babe. I'm sorry, like, we can’t. we're not going to make it home.” I was like — “this is the one time we're going to have to get a hotel.” and then I had to pull over twice within 15 minutes because she's still vomiting! and I was like… nah, we are going to Urgent Care. we are still in Charlotte at this point so we drive to the closest one 30 minutes away, and we both have to check in because also this is the other thing that had happened — I was rushing to catch the first flight before it got delayed and I dropped my laptop on my toe and I thought I broke my toe. by the time I got off the flight, and in the car, and then was driving with my foot that I had dropped the computer on - my toe was blue. and so literally we are at urgent care, she got checked in because she's has a stomach bug and then I get checked in because I'm pretty sure I broke my toe. and I'm waiting and then go to the bathroom and just vomit everywhere. It was the worst. Yeah, so that was our day. we barely made it to the hotel and then we literally probably slept for 13 hours straight after that. 

Do you have a power outfit?

Oh my gosh. Yes, I have a leopard onesie. it has a tail and it also has gloves. i’ll put it on and I'll just go to town on my email. I wear it when I want to call in the the feline energy.

There's a new two-dollar bill, whose face should be on it?

Michelle Obama.

what mundane activity do you actually love? 

I actually like scrubbing a tub. I can scrub a tub. what do i usually use? so comet it a major point of contention, gotta have the comet. or ajax. i think it all comes down to the brush. i have a brush that has bristles, like a toothbrush for my tub. i don’t know! its relaxing. 

What about like a mundane activity kind of hate to doing?

I hate how much you have to clean out your french press because of the oiliness from the coffee beans. It is annoying. and mine is round at the bottom so it’s annoying to get in there, so i had to buy a brush for that. once again! a brush for everything. 

What is one thing you be embarrassed to admit?

sometimes I'll spook myself. I don't know, I'm not afraid of the dark, but sometimes if I think that I hear a noise or I'm already feeling creeped out, I'll like run in the house. it's a real thing. The other thing is, a couple weeks after we first moved in I actually saw a black bear. that was the first and only bear that I've ever seen. it was standing right beside my gas tank on the other side of the house and stood up on its behind two legs. I had just driven up on the driveway, and it just stood up and was looking at me - and I'm frozen at this point and I'm like: all right, who's gonna move first? then it got down on all fours and just walked back in the forest. I really do believe that nature speaks to us, and because I know a little bit about animal spirits i know that the black bear is the grandmother bear and so it’s a protector spirit. And so I kind of felt like it might have just been a little protector energy being like — we got you, it's safe here. I pay attention to signs. But I still do get creeped out that I'm gonna come home and there's going to be a bear. 

for me it’s just shock. I never want to disturb animals, I respect the animal world and the plant world and all of that, and I just don't want to encounter the thing that I know could potentially end my life.

What does confidence look like to you?

i think confidence means being Unapologetic. I think that as a society we're all conditioned in some way, on some level to feel guilty or ashamed about one thing or another. some of us have a longer list than others, But we've all got things in our list. and I think that as long as we're feeling guilty or ashamed, we're apologizing about our existence or who we are. and until we get to a place where we're Unapologetic about who we are, whatever that looks like, then I mean - shit's gonna stay like it is. we have to evolve from that. 

I have this conversation with my friends a lot that have a tendency to say, I'm sorry. like, what are you saying sorry for? just to bring it to their attention that you don't have anything to be apologizing about. and i also feel like if people say i’m sorry a lot it also means that they feel like they’re a sorry person. but they’re not a sorry person. 

What phrases or words do you over use?

I mean truth be told, I’m a very honest and direct person, and so I curse often. sometimes I have to just be mindful of the population or the people that I'm with. but those are words that I use a lot, to be honest. 

what’s your favorite curse word? 

i use bitch a lot, different tones of bitch. different ways of saying bitch that mean different things. it’s very nuanced, it’s like its own language. 

What traits do you rate highest in others?

Vulnerability is probably number one.

I think second one probably would be honesty, or some version of a true Seeker.

I think communication..and curiosity.

what do you think asheville is missing?

More spaces where our age group can hang out. where can the Millennials go that don't want to be in a place that is serving alcohol? where can we just go and be and do some artistic shit That's not at 9 am In the morning or that’s not part of our job? there are some community centers..but I feel like we literally have places, but it's not as if we have a space. It has to be cultivated inside of the places we have. I think that’s why I surrendered to the fact that I'm always going to be producing events. I resisted it for a long time, but the reality is that events bring people together and it's a way that you can cultivate that sense of place.

What are some of your favorite spots in town? Where do you always go? 

I love being at the YMI Cultural Center. I love being at the Edington Center in South Side. actually, i like going to my barber shop a lot. it’s jc&co in doctors park off biltmore. there's something about a Barbershop, it's a deep cultural asset to communities of color. you go and you'll see elders just hanging out in there all day, you hear about news that way…you just grow up in that environment. for me, that's where I get some of that fulfillment. there's a sense of community — you get to know people. he's been my barber for the past five or six years…it's not even about anything besides conversation and catching up. there's a little bit of a transaction that happens, but people are just there to talk and hang out for the most part. 

What does creativity mean to you?

creativity is our divine Birthright. period. 

and a creative is a person that recognizes, honors, and practices that Divine Connection by creating a thing, whatever that is. 

What has been the most tragic thing in your life? 

Hmm, Whoo. that's also recent. I don't know if it's most tragic, but it definitely impacted me the deepest, which was losing my best friend suddenly in December. it was really unexpected. He would have been 50 in February. His name is Brian Christopher Daniel. our friends and those who loved him called him CD. he was one of the first people that I met when I moved to Asheville, and we just instantly were like: yeah. we're literally almost the same person — from our hair to our laughs to just so many things and the way that we saw life. it was the most surreal thing. then getting the news.

there was this deep connection that we had, and I feel that we still do have, and I felt like the right thing to do to honor him was to call Community together and create this space for connection. so me and another one of our mutual friends got together — and it actually ended up being a group of us doing different parts — but we had a community Altar and a community gathering at Satellite Gallery the very next day after the news broke. I was just like, I just want to name that I want to create this space, and invite all of his friends and have them invite friends that I don't know about. I had no idea how many people knew and loved him. probably over a hundred people maybe close to 200 people came through The Gallery at some point that day. it was so tragic and sudden and shocking, but then that was also such a healing and beautiful space and moment. and it was so simple. It was literally again that connection piece. and He's been the thing that's kept some of his friends together. So now those of us that just recently met by knowing him and planning the thing and planning his birthday celebration check in on each other often and just stay connected. and in his honor, I actually started a scholarship fund in January on his birthday, which was January the 30th. It's a scholarship fund to create resources and support around self care, training, and professional development for artists of color. folks can apply for the scholarship and we have people that have made donations. just since we've launched we've raised over $800. it's going to be something that lives as long as the organization. it's part of that Legacy work and the connection to ancestors — because he's an ancestor now. but yeah, he was the person that I was talking to about creating this organization and we always were talking about work and community. it's my way of keeping him involved.

it was this tragedy but it has also created some really beautiful triumphant moments.

what would you say is undeniably you?

oh it’s my laugh. people hear my laugh and they're like, “I thought that was you!” like literally, somebody will be in a place and they'll hear me laughing and they'll come over. people tell me a lot that it's really distinct. and actually I won best laugh in high school. 

Okay, what are you proud of?

I think that I decided to live a life of purpose and integrity.

What do you dream of?

Now I dream literally and figuratively of children. there was a conversation that we had at this Workshop called project heal, maybe last year or two years ago in the southside community, and one of the things that the elder mr. harris said who was taking us around in this tour was, “one thing that you will notice in a lot of communities, if you don’t hear the sound of children laughing - that is when the community is starting to die. as long as you hear the sound of children laughing and children playing, that’s a good indication that community is there.” and it's funny because a lot of times in my dreams I'll see Community spaces and I'll see kids running around and playing and happy, and so it's interesting. that comes up for me a lot, especially now. and also there is something that happens after you turn 30 for a lot of people that have uteruses. every baby and child is very cute to me right now. 

what are you scared of?

failing

What or who is the love of your life right now?

There are so many different ways I could answer that question, But I think what I'm gonna go with The Who, and I will say that my partner B is the love my life. We have been through a lot together and we have helped each other grow in a lot of ways.

what do you need around you? 

Nature always. mountains. I need it. I couldn't do anything that I'm doing without it.

What do you want to accomplish or hope to accomplish before you leave Earth?

the thing that feels the most important to me, and it's funny because I've actually had death come up a lot and I've had to grieve a lot around losing people, especially family members, over the past few years. I'm kind of in that phase where that's a thing that starts to happen, And so I've actually had moments where I was really reflecting on my life. I really had this moment one day when I was like, what is the thing at my funeral that I would want people to be saying about me? what would I want my eulogy to be like? what would i want my legacy to have been? who was i? what things did I do? and the only thing that I really kept coming back to is I really just want people that knew me and that I met or encountered to feel like they experienced love and joy and happiness. and that's really it. that goes back to the laughter thing because I think that a lot of times when I start laughing other people naturally just start laughing, or when they see me they just can't help but to start laughing or smiling. if you can spread that, that feels like enough.