I spent the early part of my career in a male-dominated industry, fighting for credibility in rooms that weren't always designed to include me. I fought for my seat at the table, for my ideas to be taken seriously, for my work to speak louder than assumptions about who I was or wasn't.

I was somewhere between my third and fourth cider when I found her. Purple. 1971. Sitting on Facebook Marketplace like she'd been waiting for me specifically.

If you read the tribute post I wrote for Vinz Clortho, you already know the shape of the last two years. A loss, then another, then another. The first domino, and everything that followed. What I didn't fully explore there — because that post belonged to him, not to the work — is what grief actually does to a creative person. Not metaphorically. Biologically. And why, eventually, it makes the work better.

His name was Vinz Clortho. Named after the demon dog from Ghostbusters, which felt appropriately dramatic for a cat I didn't yet know would become the great love of my life.