The First Year

This rose has grown.

It’s snowing! What a sight to wake up to.

This past September marked my one year anniversary of living in New York. So, in the spirit of reflection and as we near the end of 2025, I’d like to look back at all that this year brought me.

on the way home from the airport, September 2024

Work

It began with childcare, in so many places – in homes, at the library, on the playground, at the NYC marathon, at a wedding upstate. Esme, Henry, Camille, and Jude, each teaching me to notice the airplanes and the birds, each opening up conversations with my neighbors and with nannies on the playground. I worked briefly at a yoga studio, perched at the top of a long flight of creaky stairs in Soho. In exchange for running the front desk I got free amazing classes.

By early fall, I somehow ended up as an in-house production assistant at a well-known film distributor. There, I pushed a freight cart around bustling downtown Manhattan streets. I made deliveries to poster stores, camera rental houses, doormanned buildings of writers and directors and publicists. I put hundreds of pamphlets into tote bags. I spent hours sorting over a thousand movie disks, arranging their spines neatly on the shelves. I charged Spike Lee’s phone (got a handshake too).

I got my first big archival producing gig, assisting on a film about an artist’s life. I spent hours in the NYPL archives, combing through New Yorker originals from the 1950s, watching dozens of video clips of old New York. I transcribed handwritten letters.

Out and About

I saw many great pieces of art – plays, musicals, movies, concerts, stand-up, improv. I tried line dancing. I tried a Gospel Choir. I tried a classical choir. In July, after a lot of trial and error, I found a scene that really spoke to me at a bluegrass music jam in Red Hook. In a homey warm space with people of all ages, I remembered how much I LOVE and NEED to make music with others and started playing my guitar again. Sunday afternoons and Wednesday evenings became treasured times of learning and leading (yes!) tunes, lingering and letting the time roll by. This excitement inspired me to take a class at the Jalopy Theater and volunteer at the Brooklyn Folk Festival.

I went on dates – at dimly lit bars where the light alone could convince me I liked someone. At a sushi restaurant I couldn’t afford. In Prospect Park, ranking the cuteness of the dogs as we walked around the loop just as the leaves were starting to tint. I went to parties — in apartments, on rooftops, on the block. I went to all kinds of temples – Beth Elohim in Park Slope, B’nai Jeshurun in the Upper West Side, Village Temple downtown, Beth Shalom in Hastings-On-Hudson. I spent precious time with my family who live here — my brother, his partner, my aunts, uncles, and cousins.

I cried. On subway platforms and yoga studio floors, in cafes and grocery stores. I cried on airplanes, I cried into many loving friends’ arms. I ran into my ex. I saw a building on fire. I saw a gun chase. I saw someone smoke crack on the subway.

I helped lost tourists in French. I translated for a woman at the pharmacy in Spanish. I ate Columbian food, Ethiopian food, Thai, Vietnamese, Nepalese, Sichuanese, Mexican, Caribbean (the list goes on). I biked so much — to Red Hook, to Ditmas Park, Greenpoint, and Ridgewood. I bought four new pairs of shoes. I tried my hair in all different lengths — long as I’d been growing since college, a medium shag like a quintessential Brooklyn girl, and finally where it is now – short, above my shoulders, just right.

Seasons

Each one brought a new energy. When the summer came the air got too heavy, becoming my worst enemy. For me, the heat was inescapable. I didn’t sit in my living room (no AC), turn on the oven (wasn’t gonna do that with the no AC), or go anywhere without sweating from around June to the end of September. Three showers a day, never knew what to wear. The noise outside my building was at its worst (see previous newsletter, hah). I complained a lot. Brighton Beach at sunset became my saving grace — the air, one I could breathe in, the ocean, softening my skin. The people, all basking in the glory of water. The children, clutching clutching their parents’ thighs as the water foamed over their toes. On a sky stretching across my entire eye span, the clouds thinned into pink feathers. (Other notable summer mentions: outdoor movie nights at the Rockaway Film Festival, block parties, a trip to Maine, lots of tomato and corn and berry-eating.)

Fall came and I loved it like I always have. I collected and pressed leaves to preserve their beauty. I went to Woodstock and saw mustard, maroon, and hazel painted across the sloping mountains. I threw a housewarming party that opened my home for the first time, transforming how I saw it. Now, the end of December is nearing. The sun sets at 4:30pm and I’m bundling. Drinking lots of chai and remembering how much I love to feel cozy. When I moved here in September last year, there were no months before in this place. Now it is December again, and before there was November, October, September, August, July, June, May, April, March, February, and January — and I was here.

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A Few Life Updates

This fall, after a year of various part-time work to support myself creatively, I started a new job working at a Spanish-immersion Reggio-inspired preschool. I am an assistant teacher in the 2s room, called “Piedra” (“rock” – the others are “paper” and “scissors” of course!) Teaching is as beautiful as it is exhausting and sweet and chaotic. I am challenged everyday as I help these little ones learn some of the biggest things they will know — how to share, how to take turns, how to ask questions and say hello and goodbye. Among a staff of native speakers, my Spanish is improving a lot. I feel grateful to get to work somewhere filled with so much wonder, genuineness, and love. I also feel grateful to have found some consistent structure and routine, which I’ve really needed.

One other update, particularly for those who read my last piece about noise – it has gotten a lot better! With the closing of our windows and the quieting of the cold city, I’ve been much more comfortable in my apartment. My roommates and I have continued to decorate the space, with new seasonal additions including a Christmas tree! As a girl who didn’t grow up with a tree, I can surely say I am sold on this tradition — the cozy night decorating, the twinkling lights, the warmth it gives my living room… I love it all!

I also recently celebrated my 26th birthday. As 2026 looms, I feel myself coming into a deeper acceptance of who I am and where I want to go. I feel excited to make truthful art this year. I hope the same for you and all that you wish for, and for continued peace and healing for our world. Thank you for reading — wishing you all a sweet new year.

Yours,

A Growing Rose

***P.S. Here are some art recs for you all! ***

Film: Since summer: Sorry Baby (on HBO). Newer: It Was Just An Accident (in theaters)

Theater: Little Bear Ridge Road – sadly closes soon but had to mention.

Music: My 2025 Holiday Mixtape! My favorites through the years and genres. Some classics and some you’ll have not heard before.

Also, Silvana Estrada’s Tiny Desk.