If you asked me this question a couple days ago, I would have said bills. I just lost my job on Monday and this was a gig that was supposed to last for essentially the next three to four months. I felt it super hard. I reached out to my community and they were like “we got you”. The most important thing to me right now is to truly make the best of this time in terms of my career. It’s just me, myself, and I in this apartment. So I’m like okay, how do we stay sane and not just binge watch television every day? Definitely some days, but not every day! How can I submit to every single casting agency, or send them a video audition–whatever it is. When this is all said and done, I don’t have to do that work then. I can be doing it now.
What was most important to you before you had to social distance?
It came at such an interesting time, because I was overwhelmed with work. I was balancing all of the work I was doing with all the gigs that I was doing and still finding time to just be with myself. One of my friends likes to say that “the opposite is the same”. [The most important thing has] been maintaining my sanity, especially as an individual who deals with anxiety. How do I deal with this all by myself? How did we get to a place where I don’t even feel safe around the people I love? I have to remind myself “you’re ok.”
What’s the first thing you’ll do when this is over?
Hug somebody! Make human contact, for sure, and then probably go to happy hour.
What are you doing to pass the time?
Watching TV–I’m obsessed with RuPaul’s Drag Race–everything drag everything! [They] are such sources of inspiration for me. They helped me through some seriously dark times when I was in high school. Just like “who am I? Why am I so different?” My pronouns are they/them and I identify as non-binary as well–so just finding some queer superhero unicorns [was helpful]. What else am I doing? Eating everything, cooking everything.
What makes you happy right now?
Yesterday I cooked this pretty intense breakfast and I had some soft music playing in the background, and the sun was shining in my apartment, and I was warm. I looked around and I said “well, this moment is a success.”
What would you tell yourself two months ago with the knowledge you have today?
The apocalypse is coming.
Hug everybody. Tell people that you love them face-to-face. Go outside, say “yes” to events that are happening. The world is really beautiful sometimes, so when you catch yourself thinking that, just be there for a second. Things are going to get super weird.
If there was ever a moment where we have been humbled by mother nature, it is right now. We humans have always figured “oh, we can do pretty much whatever we want on this planet and yeah, we know it’s gonna die, but we’ll go out with a bang.” She’s like ”actually you won’t. You will be in your house, and you will watch as the people you see around you are no longer there.” We are just being asked to sit.
