Update for Grampa

Dear Grampa, 

I’m doing okay, good even, here in DC, where it's 90º and sunny. I miss you every day. I used to think people were exaggerating when they said that kind of thing, you know, after people died, but I get it now. 

Many things have changed. For one, I’m not with that guy anymore. I’m not with anyone, actually. I think I prefer it that way, that this has actually been really good for me, but I wonder when that will change. I cut a lot of my hair off; Dad thinks I’m going to meet someone soon. Those things seem to be related in his head. 

I think a lot about whether you’d be proud of me, whether you’d be happy for me. I’ve made a lot of mistakes this last year — selfish things, silly things. Things that make me want to be little again, want nothing I do to matter. I wonder what mistakes you made at my age, how you dealt with them, or if you let God deal with them for you. 

I wish I could ask you how you felt about yourself and your life when you were 27. Were you sure of anything? 

I wish I could spend one more day with you on the couch, asking you question after question about your life. To this you’d probably ask me why, and I think the real answer is that I hope I could gather some kind of sense of self from stories of who you are and where you’ve been, in the way that heritage seems to leave others with little to think about who they are in the world. But this is also an unfair read of everyone around me, and your story is your story, you might say, and not mine. And you’d encourage me to make my own anyway. It did always seem like you were seeking invention, self-invention or real. 

And so the conversation turns to what I have been doing. What I am building, what I am proud of. What I want to invent. 

I’m building a life, a nice, easy life, here in DC. It is a little weird doing this so far from home, but you did this too, didn’t you? You would have been right around my age, and you and Gramma had Dad. Did it ever make you feel funny? The weird thing is that I don’t feel like it’s that deliberate. I’ve found myself here, and so here I am. I’m making friends, I’m cooking for people. Stuff that’s always been part of our lives. 

I have two jobs, too. At Job #1, I do creative direction and storytelling in science and technology policy, trying to help the government maintain global leadership in science and in AI. That’s why I’m in DC.

Job #2 is a creative studio called Spaghetti Dog that I started with my friend Maddy. We take all kinds of jobs, mostly in LA, and the core of what we do is connect people who have something to say to the people who should hear it, and we make sure that story is as alive as can be. I worked on a wedding last year for my friends, and I produced and edited their love story to be told by fourteen of their closest friends before a live audience of 90 guests. Earlier this year, I was backstage at the Hollywood Bowl to see an artist I was working for briefly, pinching myself and taking ginger shots for my stomach. I creative directed some visuals for her festival performances, and I’m working on an upcoming album release for someone so kind and talented. I’m getting closer and closer to the dream of getting to build worlds around music. I make things with my hands: small crafts, like knitting, and installations for events. I think of you and your dreamy, meticulous sketches and your prototypes all the time, and I make my own. I built a 6’x10’ foamcore display inside the Library of Congress recently after completing a test build the day before in my office. You’d have probably had a better solution than painter’s putty for the thing I had to fix at the last minute, but I think you’d have been proud of how I did it. 

On the side, I’m not building parade floats or having hundreds of people over in my backyard for egg rolls, but I’m nurturing my little corner of the world. I hosted a spring camp for creative women in rural Washington in March. I’m having friends over at Mom and Dad’s in September. I just hosted my first album listening party on Wednesday and today I’m getting together with my friend Lydia to plan out the next few months of music. 

I look roughly the same as I always have, though a few things are new. My hair is back to the same length it was when I was three. Instead of two ear piercings, I have five, and there’s a rock in my belly button. I’ve only gotten two more tattoos besides the one of your hands. They say it’s addicting, but I seem to have leveled out for now. 

I have a best friend in San Francisco. She just got married and they have a new cat. I also have dear, dear friends in Boston, New York, LA (do you remember Juliet?), Chicago, and here in DC. Life these days is so distributed. I think of you and Grampa Bob and your matching shoes, a fifteen minute drive away. 

All of this makes me wonder what’s next. Not in an I’m in a rush sort of way, but as in I’m wondering what this will all lead to. But I guess I can cover that in the next update.

P.S. I’ve been thinking about volunteering lately. Anytime someone asks me for cash, I see you and the dollar bills you kept neatly in your wallet. I take out cash at the grocery store so we can give it together.