Selina Xu

My New York summer is…

• wandering through air-conditioned museum galleries, mind cooling, quieting, and pondering insects

• staying up late devouring novels, entranced and feverish, like a fourteen-year-old

• hiking in Millburn, in Cold Spring, climbing the Appalachian trail while singing “For Forever,” duetting “Shallow” amid the woods, voices floating in the clearing, shoes crunching on rocks

• tearing up at Joe Hisaishi’s concert, older and hopefully wiser than the girl who watched him in 2022, but still inescapably transported and moved by his music — and the magic of the Ghibli universe, brimming over with an unyielding sense of wonder and tenderness amid disorientation and destruction, my salve for adulthood

• bobbing to Family Crest at the back room of a bar, drenched from the rain, bouncing on our feet to the band’s explosive vocals and bombastic orchestral music, disco ball glinting, ears pounding, arms entwined (listen to Beneath the Brine!!!)

• thrift-shopping with Shi Le in Brooklyn, trying on dramatic outfits, rewarding ourselves with slices of Napoleon cake and sabaya pastry

• kayaking with Marwah on the Hudson while feasting on DIY yoghurt bowls with condiment bottles and containers strewn between our seats, cheeks flushed and hands sticky

• movies that made me think and laugh and cry: Past Lives and Poor Things

• playing Cuphead, fingers jabbing the controller, shrieking as Mugman dies for the 456th time and then chirping thank you upon being revived by Cuphead

• random lectures at NYSE, Asia Society, NYC Mayor’s Office on biotech, AI, geopolitics, this vast vast world
• feeling down, lost, unmotivated, confused, lying flat, and then stirred, at peace, regaining inklings of energy and climbing back up again