Sun's Out, Deck's Out

Spring has finally decided to come in Boston. I’ve been here six months and this is the first week I’ve experienced sunshine in its intended form. Yesterday I took off my socks and shoes, put my backpack down in my apartment, and slipped back outside with my Welcome To Night Vale tarot deck.

I’ve barely touched my deck since graduating college in December. I learned tarot from two dear friends who my relationship fell apart with and I associate the practice closely with them so it has felt difficult to be close to tarot when I’m completely distanced from them. I will always love them and value their deep wisdom and patience in teaching me this art form/witchery/practice, but it has become time for me to take on tarot as a practice fully my own. And now, with the Sun out for the first time in six months, and me considering leaving this city after just the same amount of time here, I needed insight and assurance from my cards.

My friend Alison refers to the first year out of undergrad as “Freshmyn Year of Life,” and this first period of adulting on my own has been tough. I struggled to get job interviews. Then I struggled to get a job. Now that I have one I care about I struggle to have enough energy to give it my all. I struggle with understanding professionalism and workplace expectations. I hate embarrassment and learning curves and these past six months have had plenty of both. My experiences have been causing me to doubt myself, my skills, my direction in life. And it’s only been in the last month or so that I have allowed myself to admit that, firstly, I am not happy, and secondly, I don’t know what to do about the state of my happiness.

I love my job and I love that I have close friends nearby, but I do not particularly enjoy Boston. As much as my environmental activist self believes in public transportation, my chronic fatigue and pain have made is so that if I’m not up to standing for an hour long commute I don’t really get to leave the house. The cost of living is very high considering what I’m used to in the Midwest and in order to save any money it has become abundantly clear that I would need to take a second job. A second job that I do not have the energy for. Plus, I don’t even benefit from the perks of big city living. I don’t drink, I don’t go to concerts, and I mostly avoid large groups of people. (But, to be fair, I do really love art and museums and some of the best are in metropolitan areas.) But if I’m being honest, I miss the pace of the Midwest.

And if I’m being really honest, I’m in a long-distance relationship with a love who lives in Tulsa who I very much so would like to be near. I promised myself a long time ago that I wouldn’t ever move for love again, but if you’ve made it this far, you know that relocating has been a decision made on account of a lot of things—but relocating to Tulsa specifically, would be an act of love. And a bold, risky one at that. But Karalyn! You’re thinking, You don’t do jumpy and love-y and head of heels types of love! Sure you’ve known this human for ten years, but you’ve only been dating for three months! Is it ridiculous to move to somewhere to be with someone after such little time? Am I gay UHAUL stereotype? Do I need to stay in Boston for a full year to give it a fair chance like my mom says? What if I move and it doesn’t work out? What if I move and can’t find work? What if I move and I’m still not happy? These are the questions I have been haunted with.

My tarot reading did not answer any of these questions. It did appease some of these doubts, though. I will be able to save money in Tulsa by living with Taylor, even if I work part time. We have planned to live in a two bedroom apartment, so I don’t feel like I’m sacrificing independence and autonomy. If it doesn’t work out or I don’t like the city, I will move again. If I still can’t find happiness, it’s probably not the place and I will work on finding deeper causes.

I don’t know what I’m doing with my life. I don’t know if I will find happiness in a new place or if I’m in a phase of my life where I just need to move every six months (though the expense and labor of that is completely unsustainable). I don’t know if my current relationship is The One and I also don’t know if that even matters as we continue to build in to this relationship and build each other up. But I do know that I love it when the Sun comes out. And I know that I love to practice tarot. And neither of those things are going anywhere, no matter what I do.

New Year, New You: Beauty Guide for Your 2017 Goals

This post was originally published in February 2017 on envirofemme.tumblr.com

Coming to you in February because tonight is the lunar eclipse and years are full of new beginnings. And also because this mod is depressed and struggles with procrastination but still wanted to write about this and hear your thoughts and finally got it done! Small victories, am I right?

Hopefully this first month has provided you with fresh thoughts but it's also been a pretty dark time on a global level. I know that I am feeling deeply overwhelmed with the state of the world and feeing helpless against the impending presidential disaster, so I'm responding by prioritizing what does feel in my control--my goals to myself and this world for this year that I'm determined to make better than the last. If you are like me and have made goals with yourself, politics, and the environment in mind--read on for some simple suggestions for tangible follow-through in making the world and your life better in the New Year.

Goal: Make Less Waste
If you're determined to jump on the Zero Waste bandwagon and maintain your style + routine, I suggest:
Recycling all your clothes either by donating or repurposing.
Buying clothes/personals/makeup with little to no packaging; easily done if you're purchasing from thrift stores, farmers' markets, or small vendors who do all of their own packaging and will work with you to manufacture no waste.
If you're someone who has periods, using a menstrual cup or cotton pads so that you're no longer creating monthly plastic waste. And, it's so much cheaper!
When you do buy from big names, choosing brands that have recyclable and/or compostable packaging, such as LUSH.

Goal: Buy from Black Businesses
If you don't know why it's important to invest in Black-owned businesses, I suggest reading up on it but I will say here that it is important for everyone to support brands that are confronting colorism and displacing Eurocentric beauty standards in the make-up market. And then consult Essence's list for Black-owned indie beauty businesses in 2017 to start stocking up on products that meet a genuinely diverse population of needs/preferences/desires.

For your indulgent and luxurious bath needs, I cannot recommend Foxie Bombs highly enough. I've been following Foxie creator and entrepreneur-superhero Kayla since the beginning of her product creation. She is a Black, chronically-ill, survivor, femme based in Nashville who serves up deep truths about being a Black woman in the punk scene on her tumblr afrovx.tumblr.com. (Update: It appears her tumblr is no longer active.) She started Foxie as a side hustle, makes her products and packaging by hand, and is purposeful in her craft. Very recyclable with green practices from product design to finish, her goodies are nothing but delightful.

Goal: Go DIY
This goal might seem daunting, but while ambitious, 2017 makes it no better time than now to cut down on what you buy and up the ante on what you make by hand. After all, who knows if we'll have Amazon Prime once Trump has imploded the country; we'll have to make do with what we have on-hand as we negotiate the breakdown of present society. With all the tutorials, guides, and videos, the beauty experts who've come before us have made it easy peasy. So watch a couple of videos to get you excited about creating your own products and start dabbling!

That's what I've got for short + simple doable suggestions for 2017. Go forth, do you, and make your life and this world cleaner and brighter!
 

2017

This post originally appeared in January 2017 on envirofemme.tumblr.com

2017 is for movement. 2017 is for empowerment. 2017 is for naming our existences in our bodies. 2017 is for shedding the rough edges last year burdened us with and easing back into our comfort zones, our side hustles that bring us joy, our passions that have us feeling bathed in life-giving energies.

On New Year's Eve I wrote a series of goals for this New Year, and just under spend more time nurturing this blog I wrote:

moisturize everything to soften all wounds.

+ I mean that in every manifestation for 2017. My intention with this goal is to be soft with myself this year, to let myself heal from the raw 2016 brought out. To be gentle and affirming with my friends, my communities, the people I organize with. There is enough harshness coming at us from all sides right now that my body and soul just need to step back and soak in some goodness. I want to feed myself and others the nourishing love and care we need to get through.

This is not to say there is not a time and place for toughness. Nor is it shame to those who are hard on all sides for good reason and need to/want to stay that way. That's all fine and dandy too because in my mind it's not a mutually exclusive dichotomy. We can be our bad bitch selves cussing out fools who try to holler on the sidewalk like I just did the other day, and still come home to our caves of dollar store fairy lights and Christmas-gifted lotion and moments of quiet and stillness with ourselves.

I want to give this coming year my all, to give this blog more than I have been, and in order to do so I just need my corner of the world to be gentler with me for now--holding me and my work and my passions like petals, nurturing what I hold near and dear. I'm not listening to people complaining about ~millennial fragility~ and I'm really here for admitting that the world is cruel to our dreams and that going after what you believe in is actually really, really hard. So ask for what you need to help sustain you.

And what I need to do is moisturize to soften all wounds. I need to recuperate--after six months of tumultuous housing, losing friendships, exiting (another) harmful relationship, getting unexpectedly dumped, I've just graduated from college, moved across the country to be with my chosen family, and am actively trying to become gainfully employed. So I will be doing a lot for just me in the next year. My skin is going to be glowing in 2017. My anxiety and depression are going to be held with compassion and care for my well-being and my limits. My soul is going to be comforted with the good, the soft, the powerful, and the liberatory happenings of the world. And with my heart tucked, I'm going to keep on pursuing my ambitions and hopes for the future.

Sharing here the lovely, queer, mixed, + important Ingrid Nilsen’s video for getting ready on a bad day. Good for femmes on a low-spoons day, for those of us in throws of depression, and other rainy grey moments. 

At a surface level this video doesn’t contain any “Environmental” messages, but let’s remember that many chronic disabilities + diseases occur because of environmental hazards and waste, and that those affected are most often poor because environmental classism puts poor people at greater risk 

Envirofemme isn’t a blog for greenwashed messages about makeup. It’s a place for all femmes–but especially femmes of color, poor femmes, fat femmes, ill femmes, and other marginalized people who may or may not identify as femmes–to find a corner of the internet to be ourselves and relish in our glory, find cheap tricks and thrills of girly indulgence, share experiences and survival strategies, and learn to love and heal ourselves and one another. So enjoy this video and think about how caring for yourself on your worst days is an act of resistance; this world doesn’t want us to love ourselves, it wants us to view our own beings as worthless trash, but we are not to be thrown away. 

Mod is always willing to further discuss these ideas more in depth and suggest some self-educating resources if you want to drop a line in the inbox. 

Take care of yourselves y’all xoo

Talk At Me

This interview was first recorded in December 2014 when Environmental Femme was still a final project and hosted on tumblr.com

The following is the first of a series of interviews entitled "Talk At Me" in which fellow femmes responded to questions around femininity, feminism, and environmentalism. Their opinions are entirely their own and do not necessarily represent the views of the mod, but exist here as expressions of the multiple ways people hold these identities and define them on their own terms.

Mod: How do feminism and environmentalism intersect? What are their common goals, where are their conflicts/disconnects?

MC: Feminism and environmentalism intersect through ecofeminism! The work that Vandana Shiva and her contemporaries do casts a really interesting light on the underbelly of environmentalism and whose voices are heard in environmental activism compared to whose voices are not heard enough. Feminism and environmentalism, as with any movements, intersect in the form of wanting to provide a better future (whether it be for the planet itself or the people on the planet, depending on the movement). I think that they conflict in places wherein women are not considered to be as viable sources of information about environmental justice as men or are not represented in situations of protest/organization/activism as much as men, especially when the media covers environmental protests.

Mod: What is the face of environmentalism on this campus? Why aren’t femme women recognized on the front lines? How is your activism viewed and heard on campus?

MC: I don't want to generalize the face of environmentalism on this campus. Environmentalism in Oberlin isn't just one unified front. There are a diverse group of people who work on projects related to food justice, sustainability, anti-fracking, farming, urban planning, eco-friendly design/technology, and a plethora of other topics, and each of those organizations/groups/clusters has its own different set of people who are on the front lines. My activism is viewed and heard by an incredibly strong and powerful set of people who care strongly for the environment and for nature, and I think that a lot of how I feel/a lot of things that I'm passionate about are represented by voices that both resemble mine and differ from mine (although I remain conscious of the fact that everyone is unique in their situations and connections to nature/the environment and I know that my voice comes from a background of privilege that I must be conscious of when discussing issues of environmental justice).

Mod: What are femmes’ relationships with the environment? What is the internal struggle? What do femmes have to say about nature, activism, and their identities? How do you embody an identity that engages with the production of self from an environmental standpoint?

MC: Again, I really don't think I want to make any generalizations. My own struggle with environmentalism as a cisgendered and privileged woman comes from the fact that I'm from a big city and therefore am very much unaware of the environmental struggles of non-urban communities (and generally, communities that are not my own). I am conscious of my own environmental impact, I plan to devote my life to protecting the environment, but I know that I also have a lot more to learn and a lot more work to do before I can even fully call myself an activist. As a woman, I relate to stories of the subjugation of nature as I have felt subjugated because of my gender in the past (and still do, even on this campus). I feel that in empowering women to be at the forefront of environmental activism/justice, there may also be an opportunity to empower women to consider their role in activism and in society and reexamine existing hierarchal structures that they may not have been attuned to in the past.

Thanks so much MC for this interview and your participation in my project!