Little bits of memory seep in like the days sitting on floors in Bed-Stuy. Paints on the carpet, long nights, and fresh coffee. Those were the days we had schooling all day, and full time jobs after. Those were the days of all nighters and caffeine pills, and projects due early. We never slept, music 24/7, eyes glazed and glassy. I used to idealize those days. Our poverty never got to us, until it did. We had dreams and dreams were always more important. We were Kings and Queens of concrete. - Journal entry of unknown date
I used to pore over the journals of Anaïs Nin relishing in the lavish dinner parties, French perfumes and lace shawls. I imagined dark green walls with rich reds and jewel tones decorating apartments draped in fabrics and Chinese lanterns. I imagined drinking wine and champagne with authors and artists in New York and traveling the world. My reality in the beginning would be very different. My first years in New York were in a cockroach infested apartment with iron burns melted into the stained dirty rug, popcorn walls, broken mirrors, and not a single piece of art on the walls. I saved up enough money to purchase a broken down typewriter, vintage cardboard dresser, and one floral shawl to drape over the wire rack where I folded my clothes. I also bought a vintage map of Paris, sheer curtains, a few candles that were scented daisy, lilac, and rose and a new mint green with cream floral bedspread for my twin bed. I hand washed my clothes in the bathtub and draped the damp items over a small drying rack I purchased for $10. My bedroom became a small sanctuary and I lit the scented candles on the days I had off to make them last. In the evenings I’d watch movies with my housemates or listen to old radio shows like Suspense, write in my journal and drink glasses of fresh lemonade. Lemonade is something I still think of to be a luxury item.
My days off were spent walking around New York and looking up the buildings my favorite artists and writers inhabited. I’d walk by famous cafes and bars hoping to have enough money that one day I could purchase more than a cup of coffee and have to pretend that I wasn’t hungry. I would soak in my surroundings when I did this and imagine Hemingway, Nin, Burroughs, Kerouac, Ginsburg, and Gysin in each of these places. I found magic in walking along the streets and the history that took place there. I was grateful that some of these buildings still existed and I dreamed of living in Manhattan, maybe the West village because they had windows that opened outward and flower boxes on the sills.
Image above is of my first/second apartment in NYC. My first was a 3 month sublet.
I think about those early days in NY a lot. Despite not having money and not knowing how to make more money and sometimes feeling like I would never get ahead I made the most with what I had. I didn’t fully grasp the idea of poverty consciousness because I was consistently immersed in it. I was enveloped in it by having retail jobs that never paid me more than $12 an hour and demanded my devotion in a city where rents were constantly rising. My jobs after that were unstable sometimes bringing in a few hundred and sometimes only $30 or $40. Most of the time I would get home and immerse myself in books or films. No one ever thinks their day job is part of their glamor aesthetic, or at least at that time they didn’t. I couldn’t afford a lot of new books so the libraries became my friends. Sometimes my parents would send me books from authors they knew I liked. I fell into the words and art of both the “Lost Generation” and the “Beat Generation.” Working in retail next to the Russian Tea Room I would sneak peeks inside and dream of one day visiting then make my way up to the bookstore across from the Subway. There I’d spend an hour or so looking at the covers and sometimes finding a gem in the bargains. I bought myself a plastic water fountain that looked like rocks. I loved the idea of running water in my room. My cat at the time did too. My one time expensive curtains I purchased when at my poorest traveled with me. Move after move I folded them up and took them out again. They reminded me to be grateful. This year after careful consideration I gave them to neighbors in hopes they could be enjoyed in a different way.
I want to pretend I live simply but my house is filled with trinkets, records, bones, and dresses. Every time I say I’m going to get rid of something I drag another thing in. The moths have been fluttering inside the house again. Melissa and I both know this means we need to bust out the florida water and purify the hatches. I’ve never done much thinking on space but these days I’m increasingly aware of it. It’s what happens when you come back from a trip. You assess your surroundings and what you’ve been holding sacred. Journal Aug 16, 2012
I was never able to afford living alone in NY. I never had an apartment that I chose. I always fell into what was available and this became both a blessing and a curse. I was blessed with a variety of good housemates and neighbors, I was cursed with never really having my own space and never feeling like I had the ability to have a home or decorate it the way I wanted to. This mostly came down to money and space. I actually love mixing different styles so if one person’s style was opposite the other the fusion is what makes me excited. And while my apartment was featured in Time Out NY while I lived there and Chris Calloway Brooks telling me it reminded him of Josephine Bakers apartment in Paris I remembered thinking “They will see I’m a fraud. I have no design talent.” I wanted 1920s and 30s Paris and NYC. I also wanted Hollywood glamour. I felt I had neither but began collecting small things, a brass candelabra from an antique store in City Island or receipts and postcards from Hotels that no longer existed. I would take the time to seek out and explore the city and treat myself to a memory as well. I have always been a person that collected items as a reminder that a better life was out there. My mother says I have done this from the time I was very young. I knew I would eventually leave the town I was from. I knew I would move to a city, and I knew I had a very different life waiting for me and it was just a matter of time before stepping into it. I imagined Paris, New York, Mexico City, Hollywood, and New Orleans of the 20s through 60s. My reality didn’t match my idealism so again I found myself in the library turning pages of Kiki’s Paris.
When you are poor you work with what is given to you or what is within your means and design can’t always play a factor into it. If you’re crafty you can make things work. You find the nicest thing available and play with it. I solved this by creating small spaces that felt like my own. A gilded gold mirror about to be thrown to the curb adorned the corner of my bedroom and made me feel like I had a slice of glamour. A scarf my Aunt gave me from her time in Egypt hung off the side with various beads and feathers. This became a reminder that I too would travel the world one day. Candles placed atop wine bottles I had once shared with friends sat on table tops covered in old ripped lace and oversized scarves. I placed art on the walls and even though I painted the pieces I often felt like they weren’t mine at all. I wanted a room filled with Jean Michael Basquiat and paint stained canvases. In my head my perfect space is Art Deco with clean lines and sharp angles but my reality begs to differ. I feel uneasy unless my walls are covered in art, photographs, and postcards and yet in my head minimal is better. Layers are comforting to me. You can peel them back to show what lies beneath or cover them up with another veneer. Treating myself well began with small items to make me feel luxurious. Sparkling mineral water with lemon or lime could make me feel rich at a moments notice. Strawberries whether fresh, in recipes, or even painted bring a sense of summer and freedom. Indulging in a pastry from a bakery in Little Italy or a cappuccino made me feel connected to a long lineage of artistry, culture, and history. It was a soap dish with an interesting design or a record player. Allowing myself these indulgences became a way for me to honor and come into my own aesthetics. I would look at colors and see which went well together. If you can find a color scheme a room will instantly come together the same way an outfit pops or a painting takes its final shape. Honoring my own sense of beauty and art became the gateway for me taking better care of myself. It was ever in a state of evolution. It started with places. Long walks to Roosevelt Island, I still call it Blackwell and weekends in City Island. Sitting on driftwood at Hallet’s cove waiting for the tide to wane. Traveling down to Houdini’s grave and then back up to Harlem for the historic houses and back over to Coney Island for fireworks in the evening. NY was a plethora of journeys encapsulated in one city.
Janice messages me and tells me I should write columns on being poor and fabulous. How to travel when you are on a series shoestring budget. I quickly write an email to pitch it to a magazine I like. I can use this trip to CA as a starting point, which then sends my mind into a frenzy knowing I still have to find places to stay and send emails. I pause. “It will all come together. It always does.” And it will. I live my life at the crossroads, thumb out, leg bent, with a green dress, and an evil eye necklace. - Journal July 10 2012
And what started with exploration began to expand. I started to purchase special gifts for myself on my birthday. At first it was dresses. Each year I would purchase a dress to signify what the year would bring. Sometimes I would find them at stores, other times street vendors. One year it was a golden mirror that reminded me of fairytales and a paper wolf mask. Both of these cost not much more than $10. Some years it’s not a piece of clothing but an experience. My first time to Atlantic City, I traveled alone right after getting off the plane from London. I ate in historic restaurants. To this day the waiters still remember me. I’ve spent birthdays in New Orleans, Scotland, and places in between.I have done this every year consistently not so much to celebrate my birthday, I’m not really concerned with that but more or less to make sure I am doing something kind for myself and rebooting the energy around me. My move to Chicago changed things drastically for me. For the first time I lived in a place I chose in the exact location I wanted. I lived in an old hotel right across from the lake. It shifted everything. My second apartment also an old hotel right across from the lake just further south and now my apartment overlooks the beach and the waves crashing ashore. My inspiration for decorating has been artists studios, hotels, art deco, mid century modern and the walls of the Chelsea Hotel. My NY aesthetic is never far from me. For the first time I was living alone in an apartment with good bones. It was easy to decorate and I found myself simply finding everything I needed. My home became my sanctuary and that became the basis for not only my emotional wellbeing but finding aspects of myself I didn’t fully know existed. I found myself becoming a better artist. I found myself less fearful of what others thought. And though I still deal with certain things like body issues, I find that my style fits and enhances whatever fluctuation my body goes through.
Every year I take two significant images. One on New Years to signify how the year will pan out and one on my birthday to appreciate my growth. I think about those early years in NY and how I was lucky because for all the time I yearned for dinner parties and artist friends laughing in robes while sitting out on fire escapes wine glasses in hand, I got it. My time in NY was magic because of the artists, actors, writers and everyone I met. I hung out with Andy Warhol’s art stars and made friends with artists as their careers grew and blossomed. I knew one day we’d be the ones people were writing about and books with our images would be pored over as they longed for apartments with ink splattered rugs and Chinese lanterns.
In 2021 I decided that it would be rich in beauty and experience. I booked myself a stay at a bed and breakfast and bought myself some Louboutins (my first pair) and undergarments. I didn’t want to worry about my body type. I wanted to create beautiful spaces and art and study Spanish. I wanted to sip expensive wine and champagne in an emerald robe and sleep under velvet blankets. It would not be about lack. Something that was very new to me and I am grateful that so many people have celebrated this success with me. It has taken up until now to stop being afraid of lack.
The other day a friend of mine told me I was resilient. This was the second time someone had said it to me and I thought about what it meant. For a long time, perhaps even my first 10 years in NY I glamorized and fell in love with my poverty and sadness. Looking back I think I was scared of who I would become if I had more. I had read so many studies of people becoming more selfish when they got money that I became afraid of losing myself if it happened. This was a way I was sabotaging my own success. It made for an interesting story but it created many detours, made me fall in love with some very broken men while saying no to healthy ones, and distracted me from my goals. My artwork suffered, I was scared to succeed even though I wanted it so badly. I couldn't see any way around being broke and getting random jobs. But while I was stuck there was also something happening. I still kept moving forward, trying to tap into a place where I felt I belonged or was supported. I always put one foot in front of the other even when it took me months to make a step. Being resilient doesn’t mean it’s easy, it simply means you refuse to let anything have control over you or bind you, not even your own thoughts.
My great great grandfather Carl Horton Pierce said “Man is a channel for power.” and “Man is a glorified radio” meaning everything has a vibration just as a vibration reaches your ear through a radio or telephone so we have the power to shift our own lives through everyday actions and thought process. I process and shift my own personal vibrations through photography and my home. I know in the morning I must make my bed and before I go to bed the dishes must be washed. This way I wake up to a clean kitchen and can start my morning coffee ritual. Aesthetics and indulgence have become a way for me to gain clarity and focus. These days there’s nothing more indulgent than sipping coffee while looking over the lake and reading books in Spanish (I’m still learning) while listening to vinyl. No matter where you are at in life you can tap into a vibration to refresh and recalibrate through art, music, food, nature etc.
In 2018 I wrote a piece called “Pushing Beauty Up Through the Cracks” in the book Becoming Dangerous. I talked about the ritual of creating art and beauty as a form of resistance and survival. “Beauty is never to be dismissed It may appear frivolous while simultaneously conveying something darker. Beauty can be gritty and unkempt. Beauty wears masks; it plays with artifice. It can seep into the ground and come up through the cracks. Beauty is dangerous.” So tap into your aesthetic whether it be sleek and modern, vintage and obscure, or dark and mysterious, Shift the vibration of your own life and become the storyteller weaving your worlds with words and images and transforming your life into the narrative you desire to tell.
“I don’t think I’ve gone as far as I want to go.” - William Patrick Corgan in an interview from Feb 1994
Wow, my sister....I'm really feeling all that you've said here. Thank you for putting a voice to such internal nuances of emotions and experiences like a deep yearning for beauty, for creativity, sensing the potential abundance of our dreams pulling us step by step through the habit of scarcity into something more...thank you for leaving me feeling inspired.
This made me cry in the best possible way. Thank you for sharing.