(baby karapincha plant)
My niece Corina and I talk often of the concept of growing where you’re planted.
Depending on your situation, from your job to the city where you live, this idea might involve a healthy heap of resilience. Sometimes jobs suck, sometimes your city needs a revolutionizing pep talk, more often it’s you that needs a little pruning and soil replenishment.
In a way, the public-facing internet and I were kids together. My formative teenage years were spent in awkward real-life social spaces as well as burgeoning online ones. We connected directly with one another in conversation, shared .wav files, and traded clunky html-coded websites. There’s an analog/digital fluency that “elder activists” like us have, as do others who have seen a major technological shift.
This past January I began teaching in the University of Minnesota’s Civic and Engaged Leaders graduate program, a course called “Money, Power, Policy, and the Narratives that Shape Change.” Some of my favorite teachers were working actively in the field, and teaching a course alongside my work has always been a dream.
But it was a strange time to teach this particular course. Offered as a “hybrid asynchronous” module, we only met once a month as a group. On asynchronous weeks I recorded lectures and presented notes, which they watched or read and responded to on their own time. Participation and response was required to demonstrate engagement. Though each individual student was incredibly thoughtful, the process felt like forced reddit - many of the cons of the internet but few of the pros. I did my best to make the course and our projects tailored to their focus area, but they wanted to be together, in real time. And you know what? I get it.
(Pandemic mug, still applicable.)
I have been off social media since early this year. I made this decision for a variety of reasons, the first one being the time crunch of trying to squeeze too much in. The other is the toxicity that has been dominating the landscape.
This is not to say there are no positives - I know the social value it can provide. It was a godsend during those adolescent years when I craved nerdy musical company, found hidden in the listservs and AOL chatrooms.
The tools we use to connect with one another, even those early chatrooms, were once agnostic. The paper on which you wrote letters to your penpal weren’t interrupting to insert their own opinions about the plight of trees and suggested ads for better ballpoint bic ladypens. You could make a phone call to your mother without an ad popping up. If there was misinformation on LiveJournal, odds are you wrote it yourself, not some troll or bot.
But the pan of internet connection has been heating slowly into social media proliferation, and with it business models run not on nurturing connection but rather on prolonging and monetizing distraction. What is clear to me now is that between the algorithms, the misinformation, the documented choices companies have made around monetization: the tools we have been using to connect online are no longer agnostic.
This is not luddite ranting from a non-adopter. I was the Foursquare Mayor of the Northrup King Building at one point, after all! Plenty of people have written at length about this, so I won’t wax on here. But what I will say is - the landscape of social media, from the soil to what’s sprouting in it, has made it much harder to use it as a tool for actual connection and harder to sort the weeds from actual plants. I’ve also got a garden to tend to at home, and two sprouts who need my time and attention. (One of whom is already taller than me, by the way!) The connections and friendships I made online are valuable to me, and I am grateful for them. But after conducting an informal inventory of how I actually spend my time versus how I would like to spend my time, there were clear choices to be made.
This is an observation James Williams digs into In his Nine-Dots prize winning book Stand out of our Light: Freedom and Resistance in the Attention Economy. Casinos are built with distraction in mind: no clocks, intentionally disorienting, easily accessible ATMs. Which way is out? Wiliams notes that social media is also this way, but instead of paying with dollars we’re paying with time - and sacrificing the hours we could be spending on other things.
In the eighties, we were bombarded by an ad that interrupted Saturday Morning Cartoons on weekend mornings and Full House on Friday nights. “This is your brain,” a menacing voice told us, as a hand held up an egg. Cracking the egg and dropping it into a sizzling frying pan the voice continued “this is your brain on drugs. Any questions?”
I mean… Yes, like, SO MANY. Is that butter or oil, did you salt the eggs, and why am I so hungry for breakfast? Whether or not the ad was more effective at curbing drug use than it was for selling eggs (still hungry), it is still considered one of the most 100 important ads of all time.
I wouldn’t be surprised if we see similar ads ten years from now. “This is your brain,” a less menacing voice will tell us, since we are now gentle parenting. They will crack an egg into a frying pan, at which point the yoke will digitally morph into egg gremlins and tiny chickens that race around the kitchen trying to complete tasks but getting endlessly distracted until they are all delivered to Steve’s Lava Chicken, where they are then flash cooked with hot lava and chomped on by Jason Momoa while Jack Black sings a catchy tune. “This is your brain on social media. Any questions?”
(Ginger: not a fan of Steve’s Lava Chicken or coyotes. RIP.)
In researching for this newsletter, I wanted to find the source of that quote “grow where you’re planted.” Turns out, we had it wrong - the proper quote is “Bloom where you’re planted.” A subtle difference, but one that feels more beautiful and aspirational to me. The quote is from Saint Francis de Sales, who looked to encourage his parishioners in times of trouble. Known for his wisdom, St Francis is also the patron saint of writers, journalists, and the deaf.
When I was fresh out of high school I had a surgery that left me in a cast for about six weeks. I spent a lot of time in online chatrooms, digital roleplaying. I made some good friends - some of whom I’m even still in touch with! But my most vivid memory isn’t of the games we played. It was during a fourth of July party where I emerged from my bedroom and went to the backyard to say hello to family. As I stepped outside I remember a distinct sensation: the air felt weird on my face. The air. The natural air. I thought to myself ‘okay. Whoa. Maybe time to spend a little less time online.”
I’m feeling a little bit of that right now, amidst the tailspin of news and digital disorganisation - manipulated or otherwise.
I still feel an online fluency, especially in the lolspeak of yore. Memes are among humanity's greatest all time inventions, and I love them. This isn’t wholesale abandonment of the internet - but of social media, for now. I know I can grow pretty much anywhere, in any soil, from California to Minnesota, chatrooms to BlueSky.
But to bloom?
I require sunlight and fresh air.
(Come see art on a wall, not my piano.)
ART! Group show at Inez Greenberg Gallery
Speaking of Blooming where you’re planted, how about some art in Bloomington, as part of a group exhibition… called… Blooming! Okay, I’m already tired of this theme. Too late to turn back now.
Catch my artwork on display as part of:
BLOOMING! A Celebration of Bloomington Artists. May 30 - June 29, 2025
Artistry is excited to present Blooming: A Celebration of Bloomington Artists that will feature eight artists that currently live in Bloomington. The exhibition includes Janet Adams, Joan Porter-Einsman, Leon Erstad, Les Fordahl, Dana Johnson, Steve Sack, Jamie Kalakaru-Mava, and Rocio Zungia. Each artist will exhibit pieces of their work that reflect them as artists. From Pulitzer Prize winning cartoonist Steve Sack’s sculptures, Les Fordahl’s Mall of America paintings, to Leon Erstad’s stone and glass work, and to Janet Adams and Rocio Zungia abstract pieces. We are excited to show you the range of artists that live right here in Bloomington!
Inez Greenberg Gallery
Bloomington Center for the Arts / Bloomington City Hall
1800 W Old Shakopee Rd
Bloomington, MN 55431
Gallery Hours:
Monday- Friday, 8am - 10pm
Saturday, 9am- 10pm
Sunday, 12pm - 6pm
https://tangerine-sealion-rwds.squarespace.com/exhibitions/blooming
COMEDY! FAWK at the Walker.
Join me for an evening of standup comedy on the Walker’s terraces with my sisters from the Funny Asian Women Kollective (FAWK).
Thursday July 3, 2025, 6pm.
Known for their bold humor and unapologetic storytelling, FAWK brings together a powerhouse lineup of femme comedians for a night of sharp wit and big laughs. From the current political climate to dating hell, FAWK artists will cover…most of it. What can you expect? FAWK’s inappropriate brand of comedic storytelling, trivia, and the screening of comedic sketches produced by the collective. This event is appropriate for mature audiences.
Overlook the Minneapolis Sculpture Garden with sunset views while you enjoy a cash bar, casual artmaking, and hilarious sets that celebrate identity, resilience, and the medicine of laughter.
Gallery admission is also free on Thursday nights, which means this show is FREE!
https://walkerart.org/calendar/2025/rooftop-comedy-with-fawk/
Cutting Out the Middleman - AKA Your Opt-In Moment
If you’ve looked for me on social media recently and come up with nada — it’s not you, it’s me. I haven’t blocked or unfriended anyone; I’ve just stepped away from most social media for the foreseeable future. I’m still on LinkedIn (technically), but I check it rarely.
Instead, I’m trying to connect with friends and family more directly, and revert back to more agnostic forms of communication. I’ll also be sharing updates through my newsletter and revisiting my old blog a bit more regularly — probably quarterly. If you’d like to stay abreast of new public art, comedy, or publications, I’ll be sharing about such things in those places. If you’re finding me through this post, you can sign up for my mailing list newsletter here.
Reach out via email, text me if you like. Share with me any good news or bad, and tell me all about the things you’re doing to bloom where you're planted, too.