Since University, I've lived in a few places and have visited a number more. There is a kind of nostalgia in remembering the places one has lived, however temporary they may have been.
I never thought that I would ever end up in Florida, and yet, as life has it, I found myself at 18, moving into the dorms of Eckerd College with the help of my mom. I had initially wanted to study the oceans, which was why I had chosen the school, as well as feeling that I finally somewhat fit in to the culture and vibes of the place. I remember Florida with such peace. It was a place that I think my creativity became more apparent and I finally felt safe to explore my own interests and passions. I loved the beachtown vibes of St. Petersburg, and the connections I made with some of the most genuine people I still know to this day. I remember so many days of going to the beach after classes, and just enjoying the rhythm of nature. The sleepy summers filled with cicadas and sunshine.
Like the changing tides, I found my interests shifting as well towards Physics (and later, engineering), after taking a physics course to fill my requirements for Marine Science.
Even with that one pivotal decision, I had never thought myself to be good at physics, much less to major in it, and simply took it as a temporary change after not getting into the Chemistry courses I had needed as well. And so it was, that physics was where I ended up staying in as a major and it was through physics that I was introduced to the dual-degree program that would eventually lead me to New York.
When I moved to New York to complete my second degree for Engineering, again, a part of me believed the stay would be temporary. New York is expensive after all, and I still dreamed of working with the oceans and environment with my degrees after graduation. I moved to the city in the middle of the pandemic, with the help of a close friend (who pushed even her own move day so that she could make sure I was settled before finishing her senior year at our old school). I remember the two of us sitting in my tiny little dorm room talking and people-watching out my small window, after she had helped me lug my two suitcases worth of stuff in, along with some furnishings her mom had donated to me. I was trying not to show how nervous I felt starting a new school in a whole new state, and having to leave behind the friends I made in Florida who would all be finishing their senior years together.
"Just two years..." is what I had told myself. Yet through those two years, I found myself falling in love with the independence of the city. I loved the convenience of not needing a car. The feeling of being able to blend into the crowd within a blink of an eye. When I graduated, I didn't really have an idea yet of what I wanted to do. Once more, I was adrift and simply looking for things that caught my interests and aligned with the creativity I had discovered at Eckerd. I loved learning, and as a result, never really chose a specific industry that I wanted to be in. And, thus I landed my first role at a small tech start-up in Brooklyn, as an applications engineer.
I think I immediately fell in love with Brooklyn. Perhaps because the part where I live feels just a little like Denver, where I grew up. Perhaps it was becasue I loved how close it was to Toronto, where I would crash my sister's place from time to time during the summer and holiday breaks. I remember moving in to my first apartment on my own, after a stressful summer of job/apartment hunting and uncertainties in both fields until they both were somewhat secured. I had flown back into New York after being in Denver for a little bit, with just two suitcases again, and a small camping cot to sleep on temporarily until I could order a bed, just two days before starting my new job. Over the next few weeks, I began trying to thinkof the space as my own, which lead to a feeling that I was no longer "adapting" to a new place as I had done so many times before. Instead, I was building something perhaps more long-term (or as long-term as you can get in New York). I was no longer just a snowbird settling down for a few months at a time to observe the ways of life in a new place. And, I began to fill this space with my own - from my first "unnecessary" furniture purchase of a papasan chair to the art that I began to create more of during my last year at University.
Each print from my hometown series captures fragments of these little moments of nostalgia for me. Just as remembrance often twists and intertwines our memories and recollections with our imaginations, each print collage holds elements of reality in the streets and houses portrayed, as well as an added whimsy of plants and nature as a nod to our roots and beginnings and the connection we have to certain places and the nostalgia our memories create within those spaces.
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