Volume 9 | Issue 7
Creative Director
SARAH ORY
Design Editor
MARGARET LAAKSO
RINO FUJIMOTO
Video Editor SAM RAO
Finance Coordinators
MAGGIE CLARK
Standford Lipsey Student Publications Building
420 Maynard St, Ann Arbor, MI 48109
MELINA SCHAEFER
Editor-in-Chief
SOPHIA GAJDJIS Publisher
Marketing Director
APOORVA GAUTAM
Print Fashion Editors
DHRUV VERMA
ANASTASIA HERNANDO
Digital Fashion Editor
MADISON PATEL
MAKENZIE KULCYZKI
Human Resources Coordinator
MOLLY KENNEDY
Operations Director
SOPHIA AFENDOULIS
Print Features Editor
BROOKLYN BLEVINS
Digital Features Editor
JANICE KANG
Events Coordinator
SENA KADDURAH
Social Media Coordinators
NEHA KOTAGIRI
Print Photo Editors
GABRIELLE MACK
SAM MCLEOD
Print Beauty Editor
JANAÉ DYAS
Digital Photo Editor
RILEY KISSER
Public Relations Coordinators
IZZY SAUNDERS
KALI HIGHTOWER
Digital Content Editor
JESSICA CHO
Design Team
Emma Peterson, Kai Huie, Kimi Lillios, Sandy Chang, Mary Wurster, Liza Miller, Hannah Salameh, Nick Pippen, Kamryn Almasy
Fashion Team
Ben Michalsky, Dhruv Verma, Gigi Kalabat, Janae Dyas, Kelsea Chen, Olivia Mouradain, Peter Marcus, Sandy Chang, Sarah Dettling, Sophia Mckay, Elissa Li, George VanHaaften, Quincy Bowles, Linsey Wozniak, Sian Tian, Skye Thompson, Mia Lolo, Ava Wadle, Quri Kim, Peyton Benjamin, Minh Phan, Dana Gray, Darnell Perkins, Angela Li
Features Team
Ava Shapiro, Hannah Triester, Nadia Judge, Neha Kotagiri, Melissa Dash, Lucy Perrone, Jayde Emery, Tiara Partsch, Meera Kumar, Amina Cattaui, Natasha Martin, Catherine August, Sailor West, Dana Gray, Lynn Dang, Shelby Jenkins
Photography Team
Pearl Thianthai, Oliver Segal, Ebba Gurney, Hannah Anderson, Paulina Rajski, Taylor Pacis, Selena Sun, Margeaux Fortin, Vera Tikhonova, Tess Crowley, Alexander Kim, Korrin Dering, Lindsey Archibald, Alex Lam, Yueshan Jiang, Sam Rao, SinYu Deng, Jessica Cho, Maggie Kirkman
Videography Team
Coco DelVecchio, Samin Hassan, Eaman Ali, Hannah Hur, Riley Kisser, Sam Rao, Gianna Galette, Olivia Ortiz
Digital Content Team
Street Style Editors
SUREET SARAU ROSALIE COMTE
Benjamin Decker, Sonali Pai, Jessica Cho, Sarafina Chea, Esther Murray, Sarafina Chea
Finance Team
Elle Donakowski, Suma Moolaveesala, Manvita Battepati, Rendie Zhang, Olivia Jabari
Human Resources Team
Sarah Lindenbach, Lily Watchel, Emma Lewry, Diya Nambiar
Public Relations Team
Harini Shanker, Brandon Cole, Katherine Lambert, Devin Vowels, Ava Ben-David, Ava Ray, Samantha Wright
Events Team
Tara Nayak, Erin Segui, Shruti Patel, Tiara Blonshine, Paris Rodgers, Allie Cain, Lottie Winegarden
Social Media Team
Samedha Gorrai, Olivia Sun, Charlotte Foley, Hannah Ding, Aubrey Borschke, Camila Escobar, Ellie Ngassa, Aarya Padhye, Luiza Santos
Street Style Team
Alexa Rind, Jordyn Hardy, Jenna Frieberg, Xander Bower, Ernest Hawkes, Anika Minocha, Ellie Ngassa, Nina Walker
LETTER FROM THE EDITORS 04 NEO-NOIR 06 TUNED OUT 30 MORNING ROUTINE 20 WAY BACK 12 PERFECT PAIR 22 TWO-TONE 32 SOCIAL CIRCLE 38 HARD AT WORK 48 INVASION 54 A LOVE LETTER TO MY MOM 64 OVERGROWN 66 3
Irecently visited the WCBN studio to hear my housemate’s radio show live. Hidden in the depths of the Student Activities building (you might know this as the place you go to replace your MCard) the studio is equal parts time capsule and museum. Stepping into it is like entering a different era; it even smells like an old space, nestled as it is in the concrete and glass construction of the SAB.
Besides aisles and aisles of music that, without the vinyl and CD pinning it to materiality, would most likely be lost to time, nearly every inch of wall is covered in posters and stickers. One in particular that stood out to me said “Now is the time to start listening.”
The radio show is called “Soul=full”, and is an hour of soul music both popular and nearly obsolete. As I watched the turntable spin and listened to songs that had perhaps not been heard in 20 years, I thought about that phrase. If now is the time to start listening, what had I been doing this whole time?
There’s a difference between hearing and listening. We all hear things, all the time. Listening is the active effort to hear and then make meaning. The sound of keys is hearing, the way the keys bounce with the rhythm of someone’s steps is listening. The sound of rain dripping from an awning is hearing, the music of its pattern is listening. The sound of the bell tower is hearing, the feeling of longing for something that is about to end is listening.
It’s interesting to me that two of the features in OUT OF FOCUS deal with the idea of music as a way to lose focus in one area in exchange for focus in a different dimension. In their article, “Tuned Out”, Brooklyn Blevins explores the way music offers a lens through which the physicality of the world can be accessed: “Blues and greens take shape before my eyes, beckoning me deeper into the numbed corners of my mind. I feel almost skeletal, the final resounding strings whistling through my hollow bones.” While the focus on the outer world is blurred, it has sharpened to examine their physical presence in space.
In “Morning Routine”, Mya Fromwiller describes music as
a means of escape as well. The narrator uses music somewhere new, and as the real world fades into the the dream space comes through in clear relief: “In I am back on the train, looking up from my book window as mountains and villages quickly pass by. scene, I walk through the cobblestone streets of a town and follow the streams of light reflecting off arrive at the water.”
You’ll see that many of the shoots in this magazine scenes of seemingly sharp clarity. “Perfect Pair”, mimics the rigidity of the 1960s nuclear family. creates a striking contrast to illustrate binary. “Hard the backdrop of an office space. All of these shoots the surface, to be incredibly direct in subject matter. just as music allows for focus into different realities, play with focus to reveal the complexity beneath these The giant tags on the clothes in “Perfect Pair”, the pervasiveness of two colors in “Two Toned”. By presenting that seem in perfect focus, we clearly notice that which
By choosing to focus on certain things, what becomes focus to us? What do we lose sight of when our vision by the status quo? What do we miss when we hear listen? What deserves our focus? These are questions keep in mind as you look through this issue.
This is my final letter from the editor. I wanted opportunity to say that it has been one of the most experiences of my life to serve as Editor-in-Chief learn from all of the amazing and talented people that magazine possible. I will be forever proud of what able to accomplish and I can’t wait to see the work to grow and evolve. As I look towards graduation college, I will try to turn my focus back to the present, last moment here. Those words come to my mind again:
“Now is the time to start listening.”
Melina Editor-In-Chief
music to travel the background
“In one scene, book and out the by. In another a small beach the sea until I magazine relate to for example, “Two Toned” at Work” uses shoots seem, on matter. However, realities, these shoots these scenes. the complete presenting scenes which is not. becomes out of vision is obscured hear rather than questions I hope you wanted to take this most rewarding Editor-in-Chief of SHEI and that make this what we’ve been work continue and life after present, enjoy my mind again and
The defining quality of this issue is that it has no definition. What ties it all together is the fact that there is nothing tying it down. For the last digital issue of this academic year, we wanted to supply a space for our members to showcase their ideas and creativity in a way that is not limited to nor by a specific, central theme.
The slight but significant difference between the “out of focus” and “unfocused” is the awareness and intentionality that characterize the former. It calls to attention how we, as artists and as people, have a choice in selecting what subjects to highlight and what to hide from view. In this issue, we take the opportunity to bring into focus the people, concepts, and ideas that often aren’t given nearly enough regard and are relegated to the periphery of public consciousness.
OUT OF FOCUS is an ode to the overlooked. An inspection of the invisible. A scrutiny of the subconscious. A survey of the sidelines. And if your perusal of it gives you the distinct feeling that your senses are being intermittently under- and overloaded and your focus is divided from being tugged in a multitude of different directions at once, we’ve done it right. This issue is a ring lifted above the ground and kept suspended in the air by the many affixed strings pulling it in various directions.
Melina Schaefer Editor-In-Chief
Janice Kang Digital Features Editor
5
NEO-NOIR
7
9
SHOOT DIRECTOR
MIA LOLLO STYLISTS
SIAN TIAN
SKYE THOMPSON
PHOTOGRAPHERS
SAM RAO
ADRIENNE HOFFMAN
VIDEOGRAPHER
JUANA MANCERA
GRAPHIC DESIGNER
KAMRYN ALMASY
MODEL
KATHERINE NAJOR
11
13
15
17
SHOOT DIRECTOR
ELISSA LI STYLIST
AVA WADLES
PHOTOGRAPHERS
CARLY NICHOLS
ALEX KIM
GRAPHIC DESIGNER
NICK PIPPEN MODEL
AVA WADLES
19
Morning Routine morning routine
WRITER MYA FROMWILLER
GRAPHIC DESIGNER RINO FUJIMOTO
Ibegin my day with my walk to my usual study spot. As I depart from my apartment, I turn onto the street, and the view that was in my window a few minutes ago now lies before me. The contrast between the dull, brown landscape and the clear blue sky strikes my eyes even more intensely than it did from my window, and the sun shines so brightly that I can barely see what lies ahead. As I wait at the crosswalk, my headphones sit idly as I look down at my phone and begin my search for the perfect song. The different moods of each playlist battle each other in my mind, but as the walk sign flashes, I eventually choose one of my many hyper-curated playlists and cross the street. I take a deep breath, and in that moment, I am overtaken by the music playing in my ears. My moment of peace from my morning walk dissipates as soon as I approach my usual study spot, and my mind scrambles to adjust to the sudden change of pace. As I step inside the glass doors, I stumble around mindlessly as I look for a table, but I soon get lost in the interactions of strangers. My eyes catch two people who look like they are meeting for only the second time. They sit at a distance in between too close and too far, and awkwardly laugh a little too often. I stand up straighter, and hope I look more sure of myself than they do. I look away, and as I scan the building once more, my eyes catch someone who I took a class with last semester. I debate whether to say hi, but decide to wave instead so I can keep walking. They don’t even notice me, so I wave to no one. I’m flushed with embarrassment, and all of sudden, my sweater is too itchy and my jacket feels so thick and the sounds of the people around me feel a little too loud. Instead of my music or the muffled sounds of those around me, my ears are now overwhelmed by the sound of my heart beating.
I eventually find an open table and drop my backpack onto the floor. I take a deep breath and my ears are finally free from the sound of my heartbeat. I reach into my backpack to grab a bigger pair of headphones, and as I put them on and plug them into my computer, the sounds of the people around me become more subdued. My mind has slowed down with my heartbeat,
and the lack of music allows my mind to be silent for just a second. I pull my sleeves over my hands and slouch into my sweater, finding it much more comfortable than I did a few minutes ago. But then the unfinished assignments and unanswered emails ring in my mind like notifications, and I can no longer tolerate the silence. I decide to put on some music instead.
I go to my playlists tab on my computer and begin to scroll through my options. I know that any song with lyrics will distract me, so I click on my playlist of romanticized classical music and I peruse through all the songs until I find one that’s just right. I close the tab and return to my assignment. My hands hover over my keyboard as my Word doc taunts me, and although I start to type, I get lost in my music. As the song progresses, I detach from my surroundings and get lost in the various memories from my summer vacation that project into my mind like a beautiful film montage. In one scene, I am back on the train, looking up from my book and out the window as mountains and villages quickly pass by. In another scene, I walk through the cobblestone streets of a small beach town and follow the streams of light reflecting off the sea until I arrive at the water. I then think of myself, swimming in the sea, letting the salty water sting my skin and tangle my hair. This song is the perfect soundtrack for my daydreams and allows me to travel through that vacation once more, condensing two weeks into only a minute.
“Excuse me.”
I snap back to reality.
“Can I take this chair?” asks the girl standing in front of my table. I look up at her, and her expression tells me she has been trying to get my attention for a little bit too long.
“Yeah, go for it,” I respond. She takes the chair and walks away, and now my sweater is too itchy and my jacket feels so thick and the sounds of the people around me feel a little too loud once again. I can no longer hear my music. The sound of my heartbeat in my ears clears out the imagined film montage from my head. I stare blankly at my Word Doc and try to begin again.
21
TUNED OUT
With exactly ten minutes until the hour, I’m freed from my attempts at feigning attentiveness. I shut my laptop and quickly slide my headphones over my ears. The world around me muffles, a welcome suppression that mimics my current state of mind. My classmates pack their bags around me, their bodies obscured by the peripheral blur of my vision. Ignoring the ambient shuffling of bags being zipped and jackets being donned, I scroll through my seemingly endless library of playlists before landing on my personal poison as of late.
Melancholy guitar strums ring out through my headphones. My body propels itself along my usual route; I’m heading home after another day of the same class after class, my brain fogged by the diversion of my attention between new material being taught and catching up on last night’s homework. Cool air brushes against my cheeks and the numbing chill reverberates through my body as I allow myself to slip into the somber buzzing melody of “Orbitron” by Duster. This has been commonplace in the last few weeks. I’ll fade in and out of consciousness, suddenly finding myself resurfacing in the middle of a task. I suppose if this is my fate it might as well be soundtracked. The song nears its end.
“You’re not the first to set foot here / Just another/ And I know you’re terrified / Like the rest of us”
Suddenly, I’m turning the key to enter my apartment. The metal weight in my grip pulls me from the frayed edges of my mind. My playlist continues.
My backpack slumps off my shoulders and instinctually I find myself seeking refuge in my bed, the same post-class ritual I’ve found myself bound to recently. The mattress dips under the weight of my body. I close my eyes for a moment, allowing myself to get lost in the rhythmic synths layered beneath a lyrical outcry.
I cling to my sheets in comfort. While my bed serves as a constant, some welcomed repetition in my neverending routine, I find myself struggling more and more to part with it, to return to the daily activities that have sent me into this hazy spiral in the first place. I gently press my headphone-covered ear to the pillow, giving my safe space a listen to the sounds of my subconscious: in this moment, “Jane Cum” by Japanese Breakfast.
“Soulless animal, keep feeding on my meat / all my tiny bones between your teeth”
Bringing the heels of my palms to my eyes, I relish in the dizzying swirl of phosphenes that come to cloud my vision. Blues and greens take shape before my eyes, beckoning me deeper into the numbed corners of my mind. I feel almost skeletal, the final resounding strings whistling through my hollow bones.
The crossfade momentarily regrounds me in reality. “(Dream)” by salvia palth flows softly through my headphone speakers. The hopeful melody paired with the somber instrumentals cuts deep. The twinkling plucks of guitar strings, just barely able to delineate themselves from the droning beat, speak where lyrics fail. I’m moved, emotionally, by the song’s duality. Physically, I remain in place in my bed, knees curled tightly to my chest. This isn’t the first time I’ve been here. Another tortured cycle, I suppose.
The track is short. One minute and twenty-five seconds of hope is all I’m allowed. In that time I’m reminded of the fleeting nature of these feelings, the way they tend to come and go but ultimately always circle back around. I’m here because of them. I’m here despite them. I take the slightest solace in knowing that eventually, I’ll pull myself from the haze of the background noise, new melodies coloring my perceptions of life.
For now, the playlist continues.
WRITER BROOKLYN BLEVINS GRAPHIC DESIGNER MARGARET LAAKSO 1 Parton, Clay; Dove-Amber, Canaan; Albertini, Jason. “Orbitron” Numero Group, 1997, Accessed March 24, 2023. https://open.spotify.com/ track/2O1fWJD4M38spxqK6ly8qZ?si=1a9fb3e7bf284d29
2 Zauner, Michelle. “Jane Cum’’ PGPA Press, 2016, Accessed March 24, 2023. https://open.spotify.com/track/6TNWDCAWdIrfmD4XCelb03V?si=b7fbe419b2fc4f27
A love letter to: my mom
WRITER LUCIA PERONNE GRAPHIC DESIGNER RINO FUJIMOTO
“There are a hundred separate looks across time from which I synthesize my living impression of you. And this is wonderful” (Hockney).
I’m not quite sure how old I was when I first realized the world did not revolve around me. Or when I realized my parents’ world did not revolve around me. Well, to some extent it did and almost always will. I’m an economic parasite, even more so after going to Michigan as an out-of-state student. I was a fussy kid, always crying about feeling sick. Nausea, likely caused by undiagnosed anxiety, consumed many of my days. A series of nearly unexplained health problems ensued. In third grade, I missed over a month of school for what at the time was diagnosed as mono, but after contracting it for real during my sophomore year (gee, I wonder why?), that period has just become another unanswered question. When I first tested positive for mono at the ripe age of 8 (I can assure you that I was not making out with anyone), my mom let me pick out a Pillow Pet, the hottest plushie at school at the time. I already had a bathtub full of plushies waiting for me at home, but mom knew the cure to a broken stomach.
Arriving at college was a rude awakening to the outdated and inefficient bureaucracy that my mom had always dealt with for me. Navigating a slew of illnesses that included a trip to the Michigan sleep disorder center, a call with a chronic fatigue specialist, and another (more accurate) mono diagnosis proved to be a draining process. Surprise surprise, the systems that sick and disabled people need are the systems that are in fact the least accessible. Accessing mental health resources,
for example, is an unreasonably difficult feat. If you’ve tried to use any of Michigan’s pitiful resources, you know there’s a lifetime-long CAPS waitlist. Similarly, those who are the most fatigued and anxious and those who don’t have the economic resources for insurance have to overcome numerous and often insurmountable barriers to access support. When I moved to Michigan, my out-of-state therapist cut me off, which was fine as a freshman who was awestruck by newfound freedom. But, the pandemic left me in dire need of finding someone who could legally talk to me. As I was too fatigued and depressed to find a therapist within my insurance network, my mom made a list of people who had availability and specialized in young adults and queer youth. Two years later, I’m still talking to the same therapist she found for me.
Although I am now slightly more selfsufficient and have to advocate for my health with less direct intervention from my mom, her caretaking duties never seem to end. As the only child of a single mother, she became the primary caretaker for my elderly grandmother during the pandemic. My grandma is witty and brilliant, but she is by no means an easy person to take care of. Watching her age includes the heartbreak of watching her physically and mentally regress. In many ways, my mother is caring for a sick child again.
It feels uniquely feminine, the way my mom has been burdened (or blessed, in the case of my childhood) with caretaking for so much of her life. Growing up, if she ever missed an academic moment of mine (a fourth grade play, for example) for something work-related,
I always moaned and groaned, “Mommy’s always working.” Well, daddy was working just as much and there were fewer quips thrown at him. In my head, my mom’s time was only supposed to serve me. Maybe part of that was attachment issues (I cried when she left on the first day of kindergarten), but part of it was internalized misogyny. The gender norms in my home were by no means strict; my dad took on several of the “feminine” roles, making my parents’ relationship more of an equitable partnership. But at school, it felt like everyone else’s moms were always there at their beck and call (little brats). Both my parents worked full-time, though my mom’s job required more travel. But she always managed to always be present for the big milestones and the tummy aches (both big and small). My mom has always been my greatest advocate, it just took me a little while to see it.
With college graduation looming in the notso-distant future, I’ve had to think more about my future outside of academia, where I’ve spent virtually all of my life. In a scarily short amount of time, some of my peers will start getting married and having kids. The idea of motherhood is ever present for those of us with bodies that can
bear children and are persuaded from a young age that popping out children is our innate duty. But for many reasons, I hesitate to chalk in motherhood on my idyllic future mood board. My mother did this nearly impossible job for so many years without recognition of her selfhood and sacrifice.
“Through attention and curiosity, we can suspend our tendency toward instrumental understanding–seeing things or people onedimensionally as the products of their functions–and instead sit with the unfathomable fact of their existence, which opens up toward us but can never be fully grasped or known” (Odell, How To Do Nothing).
Now that I have moved beyond my angsty teenage years, my understanding of my world and the people in it has shifted. I now recognize my mom as a complex woman who was always behind the scenes supporting me and whose womanhood lies beyond her mothering. As I continue to grow and age and more closely resemble her with every passing day, the snapshots I collect of my mom enhance my admiration of her.
Mom, I love you.
65
