jewish / feminist / artist
Life on the internet is fascinating. The anonymity grants mere mortals the power to act however they please with few repercussions. So whenever someone genuine emerges from the pile of trolls, Instagram models, and mommy bloggers, it's remarkable. Meeting @jayzombie was a reminder of how magical it is that the web exists as a connection, albeit fragile one, but a connection nevertheless to people. Yeah, sometimes they have pink hair and sometimes those pink-haired folks remind you that past the cute dogs and fragility of ego based on likes, our internet consumption does force us to at least see conflicting points of view. This interview cuts to the essence of my project, how a conflicted sense of place defines us all.
On home
My home (growing up) looked really outdated. It had 90s furniture and a big 70s tapestry on the wall that eventually got bugs in it because it is a tapestry and its that's gross.
It wasn't particularly comfortable and there was carpet everywhere, covering everything. It was the most bland mishmash of whatever my mom could mostly afford kind of place.
We had these big redwood trees that were in our yard and they grew as I grew. By the time my mom moved, they were massive and we had to change the fence shape in our backyard because the trees were so big. I remember the smell that they gave off when I used to play underneath them.
As for taste, definitely Marie Callender and Frosted Flakes. My mom, the single mom, worked a full-time job so from 3 p.m. to 7:30. So I was home alone and wasn't allowed to use the oven or stove. So I would microwave some fettuccine alfredo. I was a classic latchkey kid."
"I turned to creativity a lot after my dad passed away. That's how I work through my emotions, by doing something that isn't just sitting idly. I have to be doing something, making something."
On the internet
"I love that I live in a time where I can be outspoken and loud and tell a catcaller to fuck off and I kind of worry about being murdered (laughs) but also like not really anymore (laughs more.)
Shit is broken and I love that there is a way for everyone to be connected and communicate in a way that puts how broken shit is in everyone's face.
It's a conversation people were able to avoid by not having the internet, by not being connected with everyone so easily. And now, you can't avoid it. You can write it off, I guess, you can be like "oh fucking snowflakes" but you're seeing it. It's out there. Everyone is engaging in it, even if you don't agree with it and I think that is like so beneficial to our society. I feel like that's only going to catapult us further. That's my hope."
On identity
"Danville, where I grew up, was a town I knew all the people that I was interacting with were the kind of people I didn't want to grow up to be.
Everyone was pretty much Christian or Catholic and devoutly so. Many of my friends went to youth group and had the cool pastor/guitar-playing dad.
To be a Jewish person there especially in a time where making jokes like that's so Jewish was totes cool. Or when that's so gay was common, really messed me up.
The two of those were being used a lot. And growing up around that time specifically I was so unsure about my sexuality and like all my close friends knew that. But I never came out I never told anyone about how I was feeling about maybe being into men and women. I think it really messed me up to be surrounded by people saying that's so gay as an insult. And don't be a Jew as an insult when those were literally two things I felt represented to me."
On Judaism
"Being raised Jewish was this great opportunity to be in a community where like literally caring about the people around you is the basis of it. It isn't about God, like God is important to Jews, but questioning God is even more important. And I think that was such a great learning experience for me to be in a situation where it's like you know God's fine but caring about everyone around you and the people in your community and your neighbors and your neighbor's neighbor, even if they don't care about you, is really the right way to be."
On weed
"As a weed consumer and someone who uses CBD for anxiety and, I love it. I don't have anxiety attacks because I take CBD and it's amazing. But, I am also fully aware of the fact that this is an industry that was not a white space and is now a white space and people are still suffering for it.
I'm like livid that all of these states are making marijuana legal and they're not pardoning all of the men and women who have been in prison for years for possession and/or distribution.
I'm seeing all these like white babe weed shops pop up and it's like cool, but the people who founded this industry and paved the way are rotting in cells, not getting fed properly, not getting proper medical attention and are still there even though weed is legal!
Why aren't you putting money toward fixing that?"
On Moana
"I'm obsessed with Moana. She is a strong and independent woman who finds herself by being an empathetic human and seeing the good in something that has had something taken from them.
Which to me is this big representation of my relationship with my mom, who lost my dad. That's an experience that I will never understand. I remember being a kid and sitting down with my mom and being like, "you don't know what it's like to lose your dad. And I don't know what it's like to lose the love of my life." Why are we pretending like we understand the loss that we both experienced?
Whenever I watch that movie I sob hysterically because I see myself in her experience. I see it as a direct representation of my experience with grief and my mom's grief. How that grief impacts your relationships, the people around you and your life like a giant crater. So Moana (smiles.)"
From Danville, CA
Lives in Los Angeles, CA
