🏝️ Dispatches from a Faraway Island
Community First
✨ Saturday, September 6th is the Uptown Community Wellness Fair, hosted by me! Join us at Sunnyside Mall (4455 Malden St.) from 11am to 3pm for a day of meeting and greeting local wellness folx and nourishing our community!
🔥 From September 19-21, check out Uptown Live, a brand-new street festival in the Uptown Historic District hosted by the Chamber of Commerce.
🔥 On September 20, check out Own the Space, a confidence-building workshop for women, non-binary, and femme-identifying folx to get comfortable taking up space in the gym!
🎉 Happy Friday, Friends!
I recently spent 5 days on an island off the coast of Maine. I hadn’t seen my brother since he last visited Chicago in 2021. Recently, we’ve had frank discussions about mental health and current events, and he made it clear he would like to see me. So off I flew on a big plane - and then on a little bitty plane - to reunite after 4 loooong years apart. Immediate hugs and some tears (obviously, this runs in the family!), jokes and more hugs, a delicious dinner, running inshore errands, and more jokes!
On the island, every night was a lush symphony of seagulls and ocean waves that a white noise machine or AI could never compete with. Days were filled with hikes, fresh coffee, laughs, sun, ocean waves and naps. Quiet time is very important to me - while I love my work with people, my brain, body and heart are constantly working, registering my client’s rate of exertion, noting if they’re lifting heavier weights, listening to reactions to the current state of events, watching if they’re using good form, and counting reps. I love it, but it takes a lot out of me.
Spending so much time away from screens and other stimulation, I was really able to slow down, take in all the breathtaking sights and just be. I also chatted with so many folx who love my brother. It felt important to engage that way too. I’m grateful for my clients and friends who are happy for me when I take time away. I’m also grateful to have the stability to take that time away, come back refreshed and with a full heart to continue the work I’m doing here in Chicago. So hello again, everyone!
With you as we round out the summer,
Dana