A few weeks ago, I archived all but one of the posts on my public Instagram feed. I enjoy using Instagram as a fun way to share life stuff with people I personally know and follow along with those peoples’ lives in turn, but when I made my original Instagram account private and set up a public account for my work, things got pretty overwhelming pretty fast.

So, I’ve been gradually re-engaging with the IRL art world. For a while, it seemed like maybe something new was taking shape; not a revolution, but a revision of the standard formats we were all familiar with before Covid, and it seemed pretty consistent and reliable. I liked it. Lately, though, when I go out, things seem pretty chaotic.

Over the years, I’ve become more curious about my Ukrainian ancestry. Russia’s unprovoked war against Ukraine has stirred something fundamental in me, stoking a latent pride that I didn’t know was there and connecting me not only to the struggle of a nation’s people fighting to retain their freedom but to a human insistence on liberty that I believe exists within all of us.

In my world, things are suddenly moving faster than they were for a long time, and I don’t mind sharing that it’s been tough for me to adjust. I’m a little disoriented, but our evolving pandemic conditions have also offered joy.